


Storm in a Teacup

by Leryline



Series: Three's a Crowd [2]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: 69 (Sex Position), Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Angst, Bondage, Breeding, Creampie, Cunnilingus, FTM Oikawa Tooru, Fluff, M/M, Orgasm Delay/Denial, Pregnancy, Pregnancy Kink, Semi-Public Sex, Smut, Squirting, Trans Character, Trans Male Character, im so exctied this is gonna be sooojnkdfjskkldjf dirty god save me, ohhh boy this is going to be !!! equal parts gross and equal parts cute, ushioi - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-18
Updated: 2016-12-24
Packaged: 2018-07-24 18:42:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 55,830
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7519114
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Leryline/pseuds/Leryline
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ushijima made a promise to himself that he would give Oikawa whatever he wished for by whatever means necessary. So far he’s given Oikawa everything he could possibly want.</p><p>Except one little thing.</p><p> </p><p>  <b>[not a standalone fic: please read part 1 of 'Three's a Crowd' first]</b></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Initiation

**Author's Note:**

> I POSTED THIS RIGHT AWAY BECAUSE 
> 
> a) I WANTED TO MAKE SURE PPL KNOW  
> b) IM JUST REALLY FCKING EXCITED
> 
> this chapter is really long but they bang like 284930402 times lmao
> 
> anyway enjoy ;9

The lights are brilliant on his face. Blood beats beneath the surface of his skin, boiling, shivering, and his entire spine is gripped with a shudder so violent it almost brings him to his knees.

Oikawa is familiar with this sensation by now – after all, he’s been in this position many times before. But this time, somehow, is different. The lights are brighter, hotter, the court less firm beneath his feet. The pain in his arms stings more than it usually does, the rawness of his skin darker, sweat coursing over his skin in torrents. He’s been reborn, cocooned in victory as fresh and painful as a slap across the face.

He doesn’t hear the tannoy as it shrieks overhead, announcing a victory he can already feel deep in his bones. He feels weightless. Eternal.

“Oikawa.” The voice is low in his ear. It sounds like the earth, soft and warm and hard and dry all at the same time; he turns instinctively towards it, leaning into the heavy hand he finds suddenly on his shoulder, then his waist. His eyes, previously blinded by the dazzling stadium lights, meet a dark gaze swimming with something imperceptible. A smile flickers against Oikawa’s lips only for a moment before his team closes in around them like the lips of a venus fly trap, and he can no longer breathe.

There’s one hand that stands out from all the others. It would be easy to lose it within the tight sea of fingers against his back, and yet he can always feel it, heavy and burning against the nape of his neck. It squeezes just a little, fingers shaking from exertion and excitement and relief.

“We _did_ it.”

 

* * *

 

 

The locker room is full of whoops and yells of victory as the team yanks off their jerseys, whirling them about their heads with eyes full of tears. Some are calling their families, voices choked with emotion and bodies turned away as they try to block out the noise, others choosing instead to leap on each other.

Ushijima is the only one left still wearing his uniform. His forehead rests against the cool metal of his locker, his eyes closed, shoulders rising and falling in soft breaths. He listens to the team hooting Oikawa’s name over and over again, and he can hear the beautiful tenor of Oikawa’s voice arching above the rest, occasionally breaking into a laugh or two. He stays like that for only a moment before stripping and heading into the showers.

Oikawa and Ushijima don’t speak. They stand beside each other, sneaking glances here and there and occasionally meeting each other’s eyes and exchanging a shy smile. Shy? Since when had they been _shy_ around each other? No, they aren’t shy, but they can’t attribute any other feeling to it. It’s not as though this is unusual – they’re always like this, silent until they’re alone when they can uncork their dams and truly celebrate.

By the time the team is drying off, things have quietened down. The adrenaline has worn off, the exhaustion setting in, muscles beginning to ache and bones beginning to creak.

“Hey!” Bokuto Koutaro grabs both of their necks from behind, bullying his way between both Oikawa and Ushijima, pulling their heads in close. “You guys excited to go home? I’m so pumped you have _no_ idea.”

“Now, _Kou-chan_ ,” Oikawa interrupts him, voice breathy with tiredness. “We only just won and you’re still thinking ahead? Does your brain ever stop running?”

“’Course not!” Bokuto slaps their backs hard enough to send them jerking forwards a little bit, the locker room echoing with his loud laugh. He grins at Oikawa before clapping Ushijima on the shoulder. “Man, you’re so frigid but you’re one hell of a captain! Thanks, dude!”

Ushijima only nods and Oikawa swallows a chuckle. The hand creeps back to his neck, knocking aside Bokuto’s, and gives a little squeeze. Oikawa glances at Ushijima out of the corner of his eye and instantly recognises the ruddy tinge of his cheeks. In turn, Oikawa reaches out to place a reassuring touch on the small of Ushijima’s back. Their eyes don’t meet.

Naturally, the team wants to go out to celebrate. Most of them aim to get blind drunk and crawl into bed with the prettiest athlete they see, but Ushijima and Oikawa have other plans. Neither of them wants to go and get drunk off their faces, and neither of them want to get into bed with _anyone_ from the athlete village. Or anywhere else, for that matter.

They don’t board the bus with the rest of the team to go back to their lodgings. Ushijima raises his hand in a wave to the coach, behind the backs of the others, Oikawa half-tucked beneath his arm. Their coach nods curtly in reply, eyes flickering shut for a moment in silent assent for them to go their own way for a little while. Their coach is an old man, married with grandkids, and knows the value of solitude and silence, especially when adrenaline is beginning to run low. That’s not to say Oikawa isn’t still high on victory – it’s the only thing that could possibly bring him to such complete silence. His tongue is so swollen in his mouth that he can’t even speak.

They catch a taxi from the stadium to a motel in a quieter part of town. It’s away from the tourists and the supporters and the roaring crowds that gathered in flocks for the Olympics. It’s a dim, one-storeyed little building with stucco walls chipping at the corners and green tiles on the roof. The sign casts a flickering red light across Oikawa’s features, elegant and silent, as the taxi pulls into the curb. Ushijima hauls their bags from the trunk as Oikawa pays the driver.

The two don’t exchange a single word as they stand abreast on the pavement, taking a moment to gaze at the nondescript little motel. Ushijima goes in first, speaking in a low voice to the young girl at the reception desk. She smiles and hands him a key attached to a plastic charm that clacks noisily against the keyring as the ace closes his fist around it. Oikawa, snapped from a daze by the clatter, hurries to catch up with Ushijima’s long strides.

“Here,” Ushijima says as he holds open the door for Oikawa. The setter lets his bag drop to the floor as the door clicks shut, looking about the room and breathing in the thin, musty scent. There’s only one window in the room, concealed from the outside world by the brambles of a tree outside, light from the moon and from the flickering motel sign filtering past the glass in long, ghostly fingers. The world is silent in that tiny room with its narrow double bed and faded carpet.

“We did it,” Oikawa sighs, rubbing his hands through his hair. “We won. We won at the _Olympics_.” He bites down on his lip to stop it from trembling.

Ushijima drops his own bag and makes his way towards Oikawa, mesmerised by the setter’s finely-boned face as it’s embraced by the light from outside. He doesn’t hit the light switch.

Taking the setter’s face into his hands, Ushijima presses a delicate, dry kiss against his forehead, then the heights of each of his cheeks, and then finally his lips; he can feel them trembling beneath his own, Oikawa’s excitement barely concealable anymore. But at the ace’s touch Oikawa seems to relax a little bit, his shoulders sighing open under Ushijima’s palms. He lets himself melt into the touch.

“We did.” His voice is barely audible, and yet it’s hardly a whisper – it’s more of a quake that reverberates up through Oikawa’s bones, something he can feel rather than hear. “We won.”

Oikawa swears he’s flying – he’s soaring above the world, above the universe itself, his body as weightless as air. He can do nothing but gasp against Ushijima’s jaw as the ace takes him fully into his arms, kissing his hair and his face; his own arms shake as they wrap around Ushijima’s broad body, fingers fisting in his shirt to yank him closer.

“I saw you out there,” Ushijima breathes into his neck. “I saw you standing there looking up at the lights. God –,” He ruts his hips into Oikawa’s suddenly enough to make the setter gasp in shock. “I saw you there, I _took_ you there – I was there with you.” Oikawa knows what he’s thinking – he’s thinking of Oikawa in his Olympic jersey, face cast towards the stadium roof, arms outstretched like a bird.

“You _are_ here with me. Not _was_. Stupid Ushiwaka.” Oikawa takes hold of Ushijima by his hair and kisses him hard on the mouth, prying open his lips so he can slip his tongue inside. When Ushijima begins to respond, his large hands pushing up beneath Oikawa’s shirt, the setter shoves him hard onto the motel bed; Ushijima blinks up at him in shock, but it only lasts for a moment before Oikawa’s is all over him again, smothering him, kissing every single inch of skin he can reach.

Ushijima jerks his head back to break a particularly wet kiss. “Even after all these years I can’t believe you’re still here.”

Oikawa – currently straddling Ushijima’s lap – pulls back with his nose wrinkled in disgust. “Even after all these years you’re still so stupid.” He kisses him hard, holding Ushijima’s face so tight between his hands that his fingernails bite into the skin. “I’m always gonna be here. _Here_. With you. Even if you can be an infuriating idiot sometimes.”

Ushijima’s eyes regard him through the half-light, and Oikawa thinks that if a pair of eyes could ever _look_ quiet, these would be it. Ushijima touches Oikawa’s face gently enough to make him roll his eyes, using his body weight to push Ushijima down onto his back.

“Now,” he says with a coy little smile. “How we celebrate our big win, captain?”

That hits the switch.

Ushijima grabs his hips with a growl, rolling them over until he’s pinning Oikawa to the mattress. His teeth glint in the light from outside, positively feral in the flickering red, but Oikawa can’t keep sight of them for long; Ushijima’s head dips down to Oikawa’s neck, lips and teeth fastening on the skin. He’d been inadvertently told to keep the marks down for the Olympics – while most of the sporting world knew of their relationship already, the coach had advised them to at least help the team remain _some_ dignity. So Ushijima hadn’t been able to mark Oikawa anywhere visible during the weeks leading up to the event, and while there’s certainly something very erotic about marking a lover in places only he can see, he always enjoyed it when Oikawa flaunted his hickeys around.

Oikawa whines as teeth sink into his skin, the membrane tingling as capillaries burst beneath it. His arousal coupled with the adrenaline still beating in his veins has left him with a painful ache in his groin, and he grinds his hips up against Ushijima’s, desperate for any kind of stimulation. “Don’t fuck around,” he pants, already trying to get out of his clothes. “Just _fuck_ me.” He punctuates his words by shoving a condom packet into Ushijima’s hands

Ushijima pins Oikawa’s restless hands above his head with one of his own, using the other to rid them both of their clothes until they’re as naked as the day they were born, bodies grinding appreciatively against each other. Oikawa hums, wriggling beneath him and letting his thighs fall open. “U – shi – wa – _ka –,_ ” Oikawa spells out each syllable of the (ridiculous) nickname, rolling his tongue around the sound so that Ushijima suddenly wants to hear how it would sound muffled around his cock. But he already knows he wouldn’t be able to hold out that long. So he settles for the next best thing.

Leaning down, Ushijima kisses Oikawa, forcing his tongue against the setter’s; he can feel it shaking much like the rest of him, his throat vibrating with a needy little moan. Ushijima’s cock sits swollen and slick against Oikawa’s thigh, sticky with precum.

“I’m… going to be fast.” Ushijima’s voice is embarrassingly hoarse. There’s just something about pinning Oikawa to a dingy motel bed that’s driving him out of his mind. He _also_ knows that an orgasm will bring his adrenaline crashing down – a second round, even for their normally insatiable libidos, is unlikely.

“I don’t _care,_ ” Oikawa snaps in reply, his teeth finding Ushijima’s earlobe and biting down hard. “Put your _stupid_ fucking huge dick in me, _please_ –,” He whines again as the broad head of Ushijima’s cock pushes against his flushed folds already dripping with need. His hips hump at it, trying to get it inside, mouth falling open and tongue going slack against his bottom lip.

“Sh,” Ushijima hushes him, placing his hand against Oikawa’s pelvis to stop him from wriggling around. The setter’s face is beautifully red – the colour almost glows in the darkness, and it spreads down his chest and over his torso, tapering to the soft, milky skin of the rest of him. When Oikawa stops moving, Ushijima presses his cock down with his thumb and pushes into the soft, wet heat with a tight little grunt in Oikawa’s ear.

“Hn _nngh,_ ” Oikawa moans, his body curling like a petal as Ushijima’s hips sink forwards. “It’s… been so long…” It had only been a few days since they’d fucked, but Oikawa doesn’t really count quickies in the locker room anymore. But being pushed up against a wall by Ushijima’s hard body took the edge of things during the period of rigorous, unforgiving training leading up to the Olympics.

This is the first time they’ve really had any time to themselves. This is the first time in a long, long time that they’ve been without the constant anxiety that comes with being an Olympian. Because they won. They _won._

Oikawa’s moans end up getting so loud that Ushijima has to ball up the setter’s briefs and stuff them into his mouth to gag him; his eyes stay locked on Oikawa as he fucks him, drinking in the sight of the glistening tears standing in the corners of his eyes and the flush of his body. He hasn’t been able to witness things like this for a long while, and it’s enough to make him burn up completely.

His body bows and he lifts one of Oikawa’s legs, hooking it over his legs so he can plough even deeper into the pliant body beneath him, his teeth nipping against the skin of Oikawa’s leg.

“’m close,” Oikawa mumbles around the makeshift gag that’s spilling from between his lips. “’toshi – Wakatoshi –,”

Ushijima presses Oikawa’s body hard into the mattress as he cums, every bit of breath whooshing out of his body in one long exhale. One shaking hand lays over Oikawa’s mouth to muffle his shriek as Ushijima continues to pound him right through his orgasm, his body writhing and thrashing on the bed.

When Ushijima finally slumps over Oikawa and lets him go, Oikawa tears the gag out of his mouth, taking advantage of Ushijima’s exhaustion to roll him onto his back and kiss him square on the mouth. Ushijima can still feel the rapid rising and falling of Oikawa’s chest as he struggles to catch his breath, legs quivering against Ushijima’s.

Trying to make Oikawa relax is as hard as trying to toilet train a lion sometimes – at least that’s how Ushijima thinks of it. Oikawa is a coil of energy and strength, and sometimes… it’s hard to get him to wind down. Especially after the victory of a big game, and the Olympics is about as big as games come.

“Oikawa,” Ushijima mumbles, raising a hand to stroke the back of Oikawa’s neck. “You will run yourself empty if you don’t rest.”

“But I don’t want to rest,” Oikawa says as he shakes the curls out of his face. “I don’t want to go to sleep ever again. I want the day to just go on forever.”

Ushijima chuckles and touches his hand to Oikawa’s face. “I know.”

 

The next morning Ushijima is woken by the shriek of foreign birds; the one thing he’d never been able to get used to is the calling of different birds. They always seem to unsettle him.

He rubs a hand over his face, trying to get a grip on himself. His body aches – each bone and muscle cry out in protest as he shifts a little on the stiff mattress, adjusting his position to fit into the curve of Oikawa’s body. Once he’s there, he sighs heavily and drops his head back onto the pillow, the faint scent of Oikawa’s shampoo lulling him back to sleep.

How long has it been since they started falling asleep together like this? Four years? Five? For Ushijima, it still feels like yesterday. The passion between them – the desperation, the carnal lust – never really died. There always seems to be something new to spur them on, and between them they share an inexhaustible energy. They’ve been running at a sprint ever since high school.

Oikawa used to hate falling asleep next to Ushijima. When they’d gotten a shared dorm in Tokyo for college, Oikawa had gone through a particularly bad period of self-loathing brought about by it; they’d fuck, kiss, cuddle and all of that, but Oikawa had confessed that each morning he’d wake with nausea lying heavy in his stomach, often for reasons he didn’t entirely understand. Fortunately he’d gotten over it quickly enough, what with their living together in such close quarters, and being on the same college team brought their schedules even closer into orbit. The distaste Oikawa had woken up with soon transformed into the exhausted need to crawl into bed beside Ushijima, to curl into his heat. Ushijima remembers Oikawa telling him – late at night, and the memory is incredibly clear in his mind – that Ushijima is the thing that grounds him the most, that makes him remember why he’s there and what he’s aiming for. He’d been so embarrassed to admit it out loud. He hadn’t talked to Ushijima for almost two days afterwards.

There were a lot of things Oikawa and Ushijima had to get over in order to make things _work_. Their last year of high school was nothing less than chaotic, and even with the end of the volleyball season, they rarely had time to see each other. Both of them were aiming for the very best universities in the country and would settle with no less, and while their stubbornness kept them away from each other, it also brought them closer. Oikawa would text Ushijima at two o’clock in the morning, and a single-word reply was enough to make his chest tight. Because Ushijima was awake as well, and at moments like those it felt as if they were the only two people in the world.

Ushijima had his own issues to overcome, too. It wasn’t all Oikawa’s ass-like stubbornness that was to blame; Ushijima had never had such an overwhelming presence in his life before, and he was a little at a loss of what to do. Oikawa was a demand on his time and his attention, neither of which he had to spare. He had to learn to make _time_ , to sacrifice one thing for another. Oikawa had called them ‘management skills’. It was never going to be a one-way street – they both knew they’d have to fight through their own difficulties as a team. _Together._

Perhaps that was why they ended up fitting together so seamlessly into their university team. They’d already learned to accommodate one another – though, admittedly, not in the sports domain – and so once they stepped on the court they only had to twist things a little here and there, and they found that they could read each other like an open book. That isn’t to say that they didn’t argue, of course – old habits die hard.

They’d gotten starter positions immediately.

The nerve-rippling anxiety and excitement Ushijima had felt when spiking one of Oikawa’s sets for the first time had almost caused him to break his ankle. But, in the end, he’d only sprained it a little, and after getting an earful of chides and teeth from Oikawa, he promised to look at the ball rather than the setter next time. He’d spent the whole evening telling Oikawa how magnificent his form had been – Oikawa had never heard him speak so much at once in his life. He’d never seen Ushijima so animated, nor had he ever seen him gesture as much, or his tone fluctuate so wildly. Ushijima had been _excited_ because he’d finally attained the first step of his ultimate goal.

And now he’s here. Lying in bed with Oikawa Tōru in a cosy little motel after taking home the Olympic gold.

His heart stutters violently in his chest.

“You’re thinkin’ too hard. I can hear it, shut _up_.” Oikawa reaches behind him to smack Ushijima’s cheek before yanking the covers up over his head and turning his body even further away, grumbling to himself. A little tuft of hair is still visible from beneath the duvet. Ushijima sighs deeply and rubs his eyes again.

A few minutes later, Oikawa finally stirs and pushes down the covers again, squinting against the dim, fractured light filling the room. He glances over his shoulder at Ushijima to see if he’s still awake, but finds him dozing lightly; he can tell that Ushijima isn’t _truly_ sleeping by the way his closed eyelids flicker like the heartbeats of little butterflies, and by the slight furrow between his eyebrows. Huffing, Oikawa presses the pad of his thumb to the crease, and as soon as he touches Ushijima’s face the muscles relax and his eyelids stop twitching.

“Hey, Ushiwaka. Wake up. I have good news.” Oikawa paps his hand lightly against Ushijima’s cheek, over and over again until the ace scrunches up his face and _finally_ opens his eyes. Oikawa turns fully onto his other side so they lie chest-to-chest, snuggled up together in their toasty cocoon of blankets and warm skin. “We have the whole week until the closing ceremony to dick around together. That’s pretty good news, right? Especially knowing we won.” Oh, that _word_ still tastes like honey.

Ushijima doesn’t appear to appreciate Oikawa’s pun, but the setter doesn’t really mind that much, especially not when Ushijima’s hand slips around to the back of his neck and pulls him in for a kiss that’s just as warm and just as close as their bodies.

“I know,” he replies when he pulls back. “That is why I booked this place until then.”

“Are you allowed to do that?” Oikawa’s throat tightens a little in concern; he doesn’t want to do anything to risk disqualification, not when they’ve come this far and worked this hard to get here. Ushiwaka, sensing the setter’s discomfort, strokes a comforting thumb over his cheek.

“Yes, I checked. I talked to the people I needed to talk to and got permission. Don’t worry.”

Oikawa, for the first time in months, doesn’t worry. He leans his head against Ushijima’s chest and merely _sighs_ – he sighs out all his stress and worry and sleepless nights, finally feeling the tension leaving his body. “Cool. So does that mean I can sleep in?”

Ushijima chuckles. “Yes.”

Oikawa smiles up at him, though his smile is catlike and rather wicked; Ushijima only has a second or two to be confused before Oikawa rolls on top of him, sitting up to straddle his hips. Ushijima groans instinctively at the sight of the setter’s naked body marked up to the jaw in dark hickeys and teeth marks. Oikawa rubs a hand through his hair, yawning widely and blinking the sleep from his eyes before bracing both hands on Ushijima’s chest and grinding his hips down. “Let’s do something _fun_.” He catches his tongue between his teeth as he grins.

Ushijima groans again at the sudden pressure on his groin, his hands sliding up the lengths of Oikawa’s thighs. He lets his eyes slip shut, allowing himself to just _feel_ Oikawa and his soft skin and hard muscle. “You can… do what you like. I want to lie here a little longer.”

He didn’t mean anything bad by it – but Oikawa huffs in offence, eyes narrowing and upper lip quirking into the beginning of a sneer. “Fine,” he says, his voice shuddering and giving him away. He’s turned on.

The setter’s rough hand slides up the length of Ushijima’s cock, working it over in his palm until it’s hard and almost dripping in his palm. Ushijima breathes hard, fingers biting harder into Oikawa’s thighs, and he hears him giggle above him as he runs the thick shaft up between his folds, teasing.

“We have all day,” he reminds the man beneath him, who opens his eyes a fraction to fix him with a heated gaze. “I can do whatever I want with you, Ushiwaka-chan. Aren’t you scared?”

Ushijima’s lips turn upwards into a sharp smile that reveals a glint of teeth. “No.”

Oikawa rides him leisurely, his body tipped back as he braces his hands against Ushijima’s thighs, his moans high and breathy as they leave his parted lips. Ushijima is mesmerised by the way Oikawa’s hips roll on his cock, forcing it deeper and deeper inside of him, the slight bulge his girth pushes against the soft flesh of his pelvis. He’s sinking into the bed, each fibre of muscle melting from his bones.

“Look at me, Tōru,” he growls, dragging his fingernails down the setter’s thighs. Oikawa’s head lolls forwards and their eyes meet; when they do, Oikawa’s body shudders and tightens, and he cums with a violent thrust of his hips, his hands stroking down Ushijima’s face and neck.

“I love you,” Oikawa gasps against his lips as his body buckles and folds with pleasure. Ushijima groans in response, pulling Oikawa as close as he can, the words making his body react more than the tight heat between Oikawa’s legs ever could.

 

* * *

 

 

They don’t leave the motel room that day. There’s no need to, not really, and both of them would much rather spend their time indulging in each other than going sightseeing anyway. There’ll be time for that later (besides – Oikawa had drawn up an itinerary on the plane, mostly consisting of science museums and the sites of various conspiracy theories, mostly concerning spaceships). Ushijima has no desire to see anything other than Oikawa and the inside of the motel room anyway.

By the time four o’clock comes around Oikawa is lying face-down on the bed snoozing, naked as the day he was born, sheets thrown haphazardly across his body. The sound of his even breathing is the only sound in the room apart from the scratch of Ushijima’s pen as he sets about writing postcards to his relatives, something he always did when he travelled abroad. His mother likes to stow them away on a corkboard hung above the oven.

“I’m ready to go home,” Oikawa murmurs into the weave of his pillow, his voice soft and sleepy, his mind not yet fully awake. His eyes are still closed. “I want to see your puppies again. I want to see Kaede-san again.”

Ushijima smiles to himself. His dogs are hardly puppies, but Oikawa loves them both to pieces, as much as he’s grown to love Ushijima’s (somewhat overbearing) mother. “We are leaving on Sunday,” he says as he finishes up the last of his postcards, arranging them into a neat pile and taking off his reading glasses. He takes a moment to look at Oikawa with his head tilted slightly to one side; he’ll never get tired of seeing the setter sat so comfortably in a bed they share, naked and unconcerned. When Oikawa catches him staring he lifts himself gingerly out of the bed and pads across the little room, jerking Ushijima’s chair around so he can sit fully in his lap, thighs spread on either side of him. Lovely and sleepy, Oikawa hums and wraps his warm arms around Ushijima’s neck, letting his body lean against the ace’s, draping himself over him like a piece of silk. Rough fingers trace up his spine.

“I can wait till then,” Oikawa sighs, his fingers playing over the strong muscles of Ushijima’s neck. “So long as you keep me occupied.” With a cheeky little grin he leans in, gently cajoling the ace’s lips towards his –

They both jump in shock as Oikawa’s phone goes off, buzzing across the top of the small desk next to Ushijima’s postcards. They stare at it for a second before Oikawa groans and leans back, reaching out to snatch it and answer the call; when he sees the caller ID his face lights up and he brings the phone to his ear.

“Iwa-chan!” he sings, leaning his elbows back on the desk and swinging his legs as Ushijima slides his hands up Oikawa’s bare thighs, his strong fingers massaging the flesh. “Did you watch me on TV? I was pretty awesome, right?”

Iwaizumi’s voice is electric and he doesn’t even bother being mean – he’s too excited, too proud of his best friend, to be anything but absolutely stoked. “Fuck! I watched you, of course I did – you were amazing! I taped it so when you come back you can see for yourself.” Oikawa grins at the sound of his voice, shifting on Ushijima’s lap to try and shake off his distracting hands.

They entertain idle small talk for a while, Iwaizumi asking after Oikawa’s knee and Oikawa asking after Iwaizumi’s family and his studies; Iwaizumi doesn’t seem to notice as the setter’s voice hitches a little higher when Ushijima takes hold of his legs just behind the knee, yanking the setter firmly back into his lap. He pushes his nose up behind Oikawa’s ear and kisses leisurely at his neck, running his palms up and down Oikawa’s back, tracing patterns over the warm skin. Oikawa sighs, letting his head tip to the side, exposing more of his throat.

“Hm?” Oikawa says dazedly when Ushijima’s thumbs roll down over his hips. “How’s your mom doing, Iwa-chan? Is she okay dealing with you when I’m not there? After all, your head is basically just muscle any – _ah_ –,” His hips rise a little when Ushijima’s hand slips between his thighs, his palm pressed flush against the lips of his cunt.

“You okay?” Iwaizumi asks, his voice tightening a little in concern. “You didn’t hurt yourself, did you?”

“No, I’m fine –,” Oikawa pulls the phone away from his face and smacks his hand against Ushijima’s back to try and get him off. “Ushiwaka stop being an idiot – I’m trying to _talk_ –,” he has to bite down on his lip, though, as a thick finger strokes expertly up between folds that are quickly growing damp. Oikawa tries to move away, to wriggle out of Ushijima’s lap, but Ushijima holds him tightly and doesn’t let him escape. Finally Oikawa just huffs, letting his thighs relax and spread open around Ushijima’s waist, gazing down at those familiar fingers disappearing inside him. He shudders and brings the phone back to his face. “Sorry – Ushiwaka is just being dumb again, you know how he is.” It’s so hard to keep his voice under control when Ushijima’s slowly fingering him open.

Ushijima hears the crackle of Iwaizumi’s laughter; he ignores it, going back to kissing Oikawa’s neck, right from behind his ear down to the junction of his shoulder. It’s so nice to be able to work him over so slowly, to take his time as he opens up each part of Oikawa’s body. He doesn’t care in the slightest that Oikawa is trying to take a call.

Craning his neck, he takes one of Oikawa’s rosy nipples into his mouth, gently lathing his tongue over it. After it grows flushed and peaked beneath his tongue he takes it between his teeth, biting down a little and tugging on it. He’s rewarded by a rich gasp from above him – when he glances up he sees Oikawa’s flushed face turned down towards him, a hand slapped over his mouth to muffle the sudden sound. The tinny sound of Iwaizumi’s voice is still coming from the receiver as their eyes meet.

“What was that…?” Oikawa mumbles dreamily as his body shivers in response to Ushijima’s touch; one of his hands curls around the back of his lover’s neck and slides up to card through the soft strands of his hair as he brings Ushijima’s mouth closer. “No, I _am_ listening – Ushiwaka’s just being annoying and _distracting me_ – shit –,” his hips rut sharply when Ushijima’s thumb presses hard against his clit, and the hand buried in the ace’s hair jerks away to smack him lightly upside the head. He can feel the ridge of Ushijima’s erection pressing against the loose weave of his sweat pants, tenting the material and giving Oikawa a rather confronting reminder of just how big it is, which in turn reminds him of how that girth feels _inside_ him. He takes the phone away from his mouth, pouting down at Ushijima who’s still nursing drowsily at Oikawa’s chest, his teeth grazing over the swollen nipples. “What are you, a baby? S-stop it…”

Ushijima raises his eyebrows and hauls Oikawa tighter into his lap, grinding his still-clothed cock against the setter’s damp mound. “Enough,” he growls, pushing his face into Oikawa’s neck. He lets go of the setter so he can wrestle his pants down far enough to release his cock; there’s a wet slapping sound as it lands against Oikawa’s thigh, sticky and ready to sink deeply into Oikawa’s delicious cunt. Oikawa doesn’t even have time to choke out a protest before Ushijima’s strong hands wrangle his hips up and over his cock.

“Hey –,” Oikawa’s voice sinks into a deep moan as Ushijima shoves him down into his lap, pushing his hard dick through Oikawa’s glistening folds and into his cunt. The impact causes Oikawa to gasp sharply, his lips dropping open.

“’S your fault,” Ushijima mumbles against Oikawa’s mouth when his lips clumsily slide up over Oikawa’s jaw from his neck. “You’re a _tease._ ” He practically growls the word. His fingers grow tighter against Oikawa’s hips and the setter takes a moment to kiss him, tongue stroking messily over the ace’s lips.

“Shittykawa, are you doing what I think you’re doing?” Iwaizumi demands from the other end of the line. “Are you fucking while you’re on the phone with me?!”

Oikawa tips back his head and laughs, bringing the receiver back to his ear. “Iwa-chan, I’m not fucking him, he’s fu _aaagh_ –,” His eyes flutter a little as Ushijima thrusts upwards, lips working on a deep, dark hickey just behind Oikawa’s ear. “You’re such a _bastard –_ hey – what are you – _stop_ –!” Oikawa barks as Ushijima wrestles the phone away from him; Ushijima wraps his free arm around Oikawa’s waist and shoves him down on the desk. The postcards, knocked by Oikawa’s elbow, flutter to the carpet, the full force of his cock driven into Oikawa’s body by his standing weight.

“Hello,” Ushijima says, bringing the receiver to his mouth. His other hand is pressed against Oikawa’s solar plexus, anchoring the wriggling man to the desk as he tries to sit up. “I apologise, Iwaizumi, but Oikawa is a little busy at the moment. I will have him call you back as soon as possible.”

“You’re fucking unbelievable, you know that?”

Ushijima only smiles and hangs up, tossing the phone over his shoulder and onto the unmade bed.

Oikawa pouts as Ushijima leans down, bracing his broad hands against the faded wallpaper and casting his face into shadow. He’s still smiling as he looks down at Oikawa, but it’s gentler, more knowing than anything.

“What are you grinning for?” Oikawa snaps, kicking Ushijima in the thigh as best he can. It only makes Ushijima chuckle, though, and he closes the space between them to press a short kiss to Oikawa’s lips.

The setter’s frown melts when Ushijima grinds his hips in deep, pressing past the raw heat of Oikawa’s fleshy folds as he forces his cock even deeper inside, past the tight ring of his hymen. Ushijima is suddenly gripped by a look of panic wild enough to have Oikawa swallowing down his own pleasure in concern, his hands pressed firmly to the ace’s chest.

“Condom,” Ushijima mumbles, his panic dissolving into a frown as his hands leave the wall and move to grip the setter’s long legs. He can’t disentangle himself, though, not when Oikawa’s legs are locked firmly around his waist and keeping him in place. Ushijima blinks his gaze back to Oikawa, who has relaxed over the surface of the desk and smiles lazily up at his lover through his thick, dark eyelashes.

“Don’t need it.”

“It’s _dangerous_.” Ushijima’s voice grows tight again as the memory of their _last_ encounter with unprotected sex surfaces in his mind. Oikawa, however, appears completely unconcerned, the catlike smugness not vanishing for even a second. Ushijima is confused by it – surely Oikawa remembers what happened last time? Surely he remembers all the pain and worry and torment they both went through? So why would he –

“Ushiwaka-chan, listen. I know you’re a little thick about the ears but you need to get a clue. We _won_. You gave me everything you promised. Now –,” Oikawa clenches his thighs tighter, eyelids shivering as Ushijima’s cock is driven balls-deep inside his clenching walls again. “I want something else.”

Ushijima’s heart is galloping in his chest like a bird trying to escape a cage; his blood roars up his throat and into his ears, washing around his skull and flooding him with heat from the very top of his scalp right down to the tips of his toes. His skin tingles and his fingers tighten around Oikawa’s thighs. He’s so _vulnerable_ like this, spread open and crowded into a tight little corner by Ushijima’s body, which is bigger and thicker and _stronger_ that Oikawa’s is. It’s a thought that’s always plagued Ushijima’s mind, and often serves as a comfort. If things ever came down to a primal display of strength, Oikawa would never be able to escape.

 _I want something else._ Ushijima knows what it is. The knowledge sits deep in his gut like a laugh, the kind that clings to the diaphragm and lilts the lungs. They’d forced those kinds of animal desires behind them ever since they’d graduated – sure, their sex life was always a bit kinky, but this kind of thing had been silenced ever since their last disaster. And yet here he is, that long, limber setter with his pliant body and seductive smile, forcing Ushijima’s raw cock inside him and rolling his hips down onto it.

“It wouldn’t be hard…” Oikawa continues, if not a little hesitantly, his eyes and his hands raking up and down the length of Ushijima’s torso. “Besides. The Olympics is over, now, isn’t it? We won. Everything we’ve been shooting for’s been achieved, so what’s the harm now?” It’s almost like he’s begging. Obscurely, of course, because Oikawa Tōru never _begs_ … not most of the time, anyway. And most certainly not for anybody but Ushijima Wakatoshi.

Ushijima’s hand presses hard against Oikawa’s stomach, just below his ribs, and Oikawa’s words break off like a snapped matchstick. His eyes remain riveted on the dark, rough fingers sinking into the supple membrane of his skin, hard on soft, a reminder that Ushijima has ways of making Oikawa do anything he pleases.

He’s not pleased at Ushijima’s hesitancy, though. And as Ushijima stays stock still, completely unmoving, Oikawa becomes more and more disillusioned by the whole situation.

With an irritated click of his tongue, Oikawa shoves Ushijima back, using his feet to lever the ace’s heavy weight off from over him. Ushijima’s cock comes away from his cunt with a wet _squelch_ , causing Ushijima to hiss at the sudden rush of cold air.

“Whatever. Forget I said anything.”

“Oikawa.”

Ushijima’s voice stops Oikawa dead as he makes to hop off the desk. It’s a knee-jerk reaction that he’s had ever since they’d met – when Ushijima uses _that_ particular tone, Oikawa’s body freezes. It always has.

He’s looking at him, golden eyes tight and hard, his dripping cock caught up in a clenched fist. Oikawa can’t help but let his eyes roam over the planes of corded muscle on Ushijima’s thighs, the broad range of his shoulders – _fuck_ , Oikawa thinks, and feels his pussy grow uncomfortably wet between his legs.

“Do you remember our agreement?” Ushijima asks in that same tone, placing particular emphasis on _agreement_. Oikawa shivers at the memory, then nods mutely. “Remind me of it.”

Oikawa slowly eases himself off the desk but keeps a hold on it just in case he melts to the floor. “I… you can use me. Wherever and whenever you want.” He licks his lips. _You can fuck any part of me whenever and wherever you want._

“That’s right.” Ushijima gives his cock a long, wet stroke. “Get on your knees.”

Oh, yes, Oikawa remembers their agreement. He remembers when he’d made it, too – they’d been sitting on the bus on their way home from a movie theatre after Ushijima had surprised him by presenting tickets to a sold-out viewing of Oikawa’s favourite film. It had been a stellar afternoon; it was on that bus that Ushijima had placed a hand on Oikawa’s thigh and every cell in the setter’s body had practically melted into the touch; it was on that bus that he’d leaned in close and murmured in Ushijima’s ear that he was little more than an open hole to fuck wherever and whenever it pleased him. Saying those words had made Oikawa’s body tingle then and they make it tingle now.

Oikawa slides to his knees, the motion as fluid and seamless as when he’s on the court. He loves being on his knees like this, with Ushijima’s sticky, hard cock only inches from his lips. _That_ is something he’d never readily admit to anyone, not even to Ushijima, but he knows that the ace really does know better. He knows what Oikawa wants, especially when it comes to sex.

“Open your mouth – I shouldn’t need to instruct you, Oikawa. You should know what to do by now.”

Oikawa sneers up at him, but doesn’t say anything, and doesn’t talk back. A cool sensation begins to spread down from the back of his neck, replacing the ravenous hunger deep in his gut with something a little smoother and a little calmer. He reaches out and slips his long fingers beneath Ushijima’s, wrapping his hand fully around his cock. He’s still endeared by the size: he can only just touch his fingers around it, and considering his fingers are especially long, that’s certainly something. His mind becomes hazy as he imagines it splitting open the tight ring of his asshole or parting the fleshy lips of his cunt, forcing its way deep inside him and bloating him with that delicious, potent cum –

Oikawa’s fleshy lips close around the tip of Ushijima’s cock. He can taste his own juices on the glans and laps his tongue greedily, his eyes fluttering shut as his groin clenches. He regrets being moody, now; he could have had this delicious cock pounding him into oblivion already. He tips his head back and moans, letting his eyes flutter shut again and concentrating on the feeling of Ushijima’s heady dick sliding over his tongue. He loves the feel of it, the taste of it; it’s something he’s learned to love – much like the rest of Ushijima, it would appear – and something he’s learned to crave, brought about mostly by quick semi-public blowjobs that made the hairs on the back of Oikawa’s neck prickle with excitement. The messy, sloppy ones are always the best as far as Oikawa is concerned, when Ushijima takes his face into his big hands and fucks down his throat, and he doesn’t doubt that Ushijima gets off to the sight of the setter’s handsome face smeared with spit and cum as well.

The setter vacantly begins to grind himself against the coarse weave of the carpet as the broad head of Ushijima’s cock pops past the tight, spongy passage just behind his tongue and into his throat. Oikawa wants to vomit, but to him that’s the most pleasurable part of it – Ushijima forcing something inside him, forgoing comfort for pleasure. Oikawa’s lewd moan is muffled around the thick cock shoved down his throat.

His throat is tight and hot and dripping. Ushijima always thinks it to be thinner than Oikawa’s cunt, a little harder as the glans of his cock slide over the ridges of Oikawa’s trachea. But it has its own allure, a certain filthiness and power that nothing else can give him. He can plug up that quick-talking, rude little mouth and put it to _much_ better use.

“Stop it,” Ushijima growls, using his foot to push against Oikawa’s thigh and knock him off balance. The hand around the base of his cock tightens, drawing the ace’s eyes back to Oikawa’s face; Oikawa’s eyelids droop low over his eyes, his throat writing as he pulls off Ushijima’s sticky cock. He begins to lap at it with his soft pink tongue, straddling Ushijima’s instep and beginning to grind his swollen pussy over the jutting bones of the ace’s ankle, drenching the skin with a sluice of juices.

It’s as though he’s ignoring him, as though Ushijima isn’t even attached to the cock Oikawa is sucking at so desperately. Oikawa humps his hips desperately against Ushijima’s ankle, though, moaning so wanly that Ushijima can’t help but reach out and run a hand through his hair. It’s then that Oikawa upturns his big, dark eyes, fixing Ushijima with a look that’s nothing short of adoring. There’s no remnant of the moody, dismissive Oikawa that had plagued them before.

Ushijima’s hand tightens into a fist in Oikawa’s hair and he pulls the setter’s head off his cock with a wet _squelch_ accompanied by a number of gargling coughs. “Show yourself to me.”

The words are like a spell. Oikawa smiles, his lips glistening with saliva as he lifts himself only slightly in order to roll over onto his hands and his knees. Ushijima takes hold of his cock again, stroking it long and slow, watching as Oikawa drops his torso to the carpet and raises his ass into the air. He reaches back behind him to spread the swollen, dripping lips of his cunt, revealing the little pink hole that’s practically gasping for cock.

Ushijima bites back a smile. _It’s mine_ , he thinks, and then lets his eyes roam hungrily over the pliant body beneath him. _He’s all mine._

That’s as much as he can take. He drops to one knee, keeping his balance by sinking one of his hands into the soft pale flesh of Oikawa’s ass, and presses the head of his cock to Oikawa’s cunt.

“Hurry,” Oikawa moans into the carpet, his tongue lolling and eyes rapidly blinking away desperate tears. “Hurry, _please_ –,”

Ushijima only needs to give a little push at the right angle to slide his cock balls-deep in one go. Oikawa’s moan is loud and hoarse, his long fingers gripping at the carpet. His entire body begins to tremble and Ushijima strokes a soothing palm up his spine. “Easy,” he murmurs, pulling out slowly before slamming home again. Oikawa’s shoulders hunch up near his ears and Ushijima can tell he’s trying not to scream.

He bends his body up over Oikawa’s one hand grazing up the setter’s side and the other holding the hair back from his face. “I want to hear your voice,” Ushijima breathes, his hot breath assaulting the delicate spiral of Oikawa’s ear. Oikawa shudders, raising his face from the carpet.

“Then hurry up and _fuck me_ already.” The words are hard. Sharp. Ushijima can detect a glimmer of a smile in Oikawa’s eyes.

“Fine.”

Cold air rushes in as Ushijima straightens up, grasping Oikawa’s hips with both hands and yanking the setter’s hips back against his groin. He has to concentrate on thrusting hard and deep as well as fast, because if he doesn’t pay attention then his cock might just slip free, and he needs to keep momentum if he’s going to reduce the man beneath him to a puddle of jelly.

Oikawa has to stuff his own fingers into his mouth to stop himself from shrieking in mind-numbing pleasure. Such intense pleasure usually intersected with pain, at least to the unassuming ear, and they’d had a few more-than-embarrassing moments with their own neighbours and a few police officers.

Oikawa likes it best when it’s raw. He knows this, Ushijima knows this, but after their frightening run-in with (albeit misdiagnosed) pregnancy in high school, they don’t have the courage to risk it. Oikawa has a taste for danger (as Ushijima had rather rudely found out at the back of a bus when Oikawa shoved his face into his lap), but he’d also managed to find a certain complacency in being safe, one which Iwaizumi had roared with laughter about for at least ten minutes after Oikawa had admitted it to him. Oikawa Tōru is risky by nature. Ushijima Wakatoshi is the exact opposite. Together they manage to strike a balance.

This, Oikawa knows, is not safe. It’s not safe to have the searing head of Ushijima’s cock pounding against his cervix time and time again, his womb pressed firmly between his spine and the palm of Ushijima’s hand pressed flush over his abdomen. This is something he’s been craving, something he’s been thirsting for ever since Ushijima had rolled on the first condom years and years ago. The fiery, sticky rawness of Ushijima’s cock inside him.

Oikawa’s walls gripped at the girth inside him as it moved, trying to pull it back inside, trying to work the shaft in order to milk every drop of potent sperm out of Ushijima’s powerful body. Oikawa, mustering all the coherency of movement he can, begins to thrust his hips back against Ushijima’s own wild thrusting. The small room is filled with the obscene sounds of wet, slapping flesh, melting into a constant moan in the setter’s ears.

Ushijima’s fingers are gripping a little tighter than usual. He angles Oikawa’s hips, eyes riveted on the red sucking flesh so wet that it’s dripping down onto the carpet, long strings of precum connecting the dark weave with Oikawa’s swollen folds. _He’s so beautiful,_ Ushijima thinks through his hazy mind; excitement coils tight in the cradle of his abdomen, his guts twisting into a tight knot when Oikawa looks back over his shoulder with an expression so utterly wrecked that it’s a wonder Ushijima doesn’t cum then and there.

“Inside me,” Oikawa breathes, his voice broken by a hiccup. He humps his hips backwards as fervently as he can, but when Ushijima flips him over onto his back and pressed the pad of his thumb to his clit, all he can do is throw his head back and shriek. The stimulation is too much – Ushijima’s clumsy inexperience had been cute at first, but over the years he’d grown talented with his fingers, and by this point he knows every nook and cranny of Oikawa’s body.

He knows just what buttons to hit.

“You got tight,” Ushijima observes and his voice is hoarse; he hooks Oikawa’s legs over his shoulders and anchors his weight, using it to drive his cock as deep as he can against the mouth of Oikawa’s fertile womb.

His spine prickles.

He knows he should pull out. He knows he should pull out and rub himself against Oikawa’s smooth skin until he cums, or that he should use Oikawa’s mouth – but he can’t. Something is stopping him. He can’t even bear the thought of slowing down his bruising thrusts, thrusts that have reduced the setter into a useless pile of pliable goo. Ushijima pushes Oikawa’s knees back towards his chin, leaning down to kiss that sloppy, ruined mouth. Oikawa’s teary eyes close, then, and he moans, his trembling arms coming up to wind around Ushijima’s neck.

“Inside, inside,” Oikawa says as though it’s the only thing he knows how to say, panting in an excited whisper over and over again. His voice wants it. His _body_ wants it. It’s writhing and humping and wriggling itself as far down on Ushijima’s delicious cock as it can.

The build up is like thunder. Oikawa and Ushijima can have orgasms many different ways, but this type is always the most exciting – the slow compounding of white noise that sets a pressure behind their eyes, as though their muscles are crying and their skin is trying its hardest to meld together, to connect them by membrane, to make them become one. Ushijima wraps his arms around Oikawa, humping his hips deep, pulling the setter’s shaking body against his own and pressing the heated cores of their bodies as closely together as possible. He muffled his moans in the crook of Oikawa’s neck, letting his lips fall open and his tongue loll so he can press heated kisses to the skin.

“…toshi,” Oikawa gasps, hands tight in Ushijima’s hair. His hips have little room to move with Ushijima pinning him to the carpet like this, but he whines desperately, burying his nose in the ace’s hair to try and drown himself in the scent. “Inside, inside, fuck me –,”

He knows he shouldn’t have done it. Ushijima shouldn’t have pressed Oikawa’s beautiful body into the floor, he shouldn’t have held himself deep inside Oikawa’s accommodating, thirsting cunt, he shouldn’t have released load after load of cum inside Oikawa’s hot, wet depths. He knows he shouldn’t have.

But he did.

Oikawa lies there gasping, his hair stuck to his face with sweat, lips bitten and bruised. He’s staring at some obscure spot on the easternmost wall of the dingy little room, letting his chest just rise and fall with rapid breaths. He can’t move. All he can do is lie there and wallow in the warm tingling between his legs.

“Ah…” Ushijima’s body creaks into action like rusty clockwork; instead of disentangling himself from Oikawa’s body, though, he takes the setter into his arms and spends a minute just kissing his face. Then he carries Oikawa to the bed, lying nestled with him in the warm nest of sheets, spending ten minutes with his head sunk between the setter’s thighs lapping lazily at his thoroughly-fucked cunt. Then for they merely lay in silence another half an hour until Oikawa’s thighs stopped quivering, Ushijima’s hand drawing sleepy circles up and down his arm.

“I want a shower,” is the first thing Oikawa says. He mumbles it into the slope of Ushijima’s shoulder, eyes averted and pouty. “Carry me.” Limber arms rise into the air and Ushijima obliges, lifting Oikawa like a child and carrying him into the little cramped bathroom.

The bathtub is too small for either of them, let alone _both_ of them, so it’s a small miracle that they manage to slot both of their bodies into it with some room to spare. Ushijima cradles Oikawa against his chest, gently lathing shampoo into his hair. The only sound in the room is the muted splash of water and the dripping of the sink.

“I apologise,” Ushijima begins. “I should have exerted more self control.”

Oikawa doesn’t reply. For a second Ushijima’s heart goes cold with the thought that Oikawa might be _mad_ at him, but after he gently tilts the setter’s face back a little, he merely chuckles fondly.

Oikawa has already fallen asleep.

 

When Oikawa wakes he’s blinded by the skewed early-morning sunlight that filters through the window. The curtains hadn’t been drawn; with a groan he wrestles himself up into a sitting position, using his hand to shield the light from his eyes.

He glances down – Ushijima’s arm is thrown across his lap, the ace’s face turned into the pillow. Oikawa whacks him on the shoulder. “Ushiwaka, wake up.”

Ushijima stirs, inhaling deeply and rubbing a hand over his eyes, blinking in confusion.

“’s something wrong?” he asks, blinking up at Oikawa, his hair sporting a cowlick so magnificent that Oikawa has to bite back a giggle.

“Yes. I’ve got cabin fever.” Oikawa leans back onto his hand, using the other to fiddle with the ends of Ushijima’s hair that point towards the ceiling. Ushijima frowns, a small, worried wrinkle appearing in the middle of his forehead. Oikawa has learned that he does that whenever he’s worried.

“Fever? Do you need to see a doctor?”

Oikawa tugs on Ushijima’s hair before running the tips of his fingers down Ushijima’s handsome face. “No, you idiot. I need to go somewhere. Let’s go out and have breakfast someplace nice, okay?” He leans down until he’s nose-to-nose with Ushijima. “When I’m with you one of my favourite things to look at is the ceiling, but even I have my limits, hm?” He presses a chaste kiss to Ushijima’s lips.

“All right,” Ushijima sighs. “I suppose you already have somewhere in mind?”

“I _always_ do, Ushiwaka-chan!” Oikawa slips him a quick smile before bouncing out of bed and beginning to change. He catches Ushijima wandering into the bathroom out of the corner of his eye, and by the time he’s finished combing his hair Ushijima is already sitting in the armchair by the door, ready to go, cowlick still endearingly unfixed.

They’re both oddly unused to the direct sunlight; Ushijima turns his face into the warmth, though, eyes closing for the briefest of seconds before he begins to follow Oikawa down the path running along the side of the road. It’s hot, but instead of cicadas there comes the trilling of hundreds of birds, all hidden and foreign. They walk in silence and in single-file, since the road is narrow and bracketed by a steep slope on one side and the road on the other.

“Where are we going?” Ushijima asks; all he can see is unkempt scrub and the jagged outline of the city a few miles away. But Oikawa is humming along with his hands tucked into his pockets, kicking along a stone made of clay that flakes and breaks apart each time it connects with the toe of his shoe.

“Just someplace I saw the night we came here,” Oikawa replies with airy indifference. “You’ll like it, I promise. I don’t think they serve hayashi rice, though.”

Ushijima’s smile is crooked. “I do not eat hayashi rice for breakfast.”

The silence they fall into is a comfortable one. Their shoes crunch on the packed dirt that soon turns into misaligned pavement; the scrub opens out into various shops and the road becomes wider, lined with cars and power poles, brightly coloured birds sitting fat and feathery on the lines.

The place they go to is small, but it’s busy and on the main boulevard. By the time they find a table the air is already hot and muggy and full of swarming insects. Oikawa takes to fanning himself with a folded newspaper, eyes closed and head tipped back until their waitress brings iced water.

Ushijima is unfamiliar with the menu. He’d been abroad before, of course, but even then he’d never been confronted by things like this in a language he can’t read. This restaurant isn’t in the main part of town and obviously doesn’t cater to foreigners often, but Oikawa seems to understand what it says.

“Would you like me to order for you, Ushiwaka-chan?” Oikawa asks smugly from over the top of his menu.

“Yes, please,” Ushijima replies. The fact that he isn’t abashed sets off a tick of familiar irritation in the back of Oikawa’s neck.

The fans whir over head, deterring most of the bugs and casting a warm breeze over the patrons clustered inside the restaurant. It’s brightly-painted and stung with an array of garish paper ornaments and framed photographs. Oikawa can’t stop looking around, admiring the dizzying colours and the fresh, browned faces of the old men and young women. Ushijima – after finding a newspaper in English – is flipping through the bulletin, his reading glasses slipping down the sweaty ride of his nose, the paper rustling in the stagnant air.

“I should have had more control last night,” Ushijima says suddenly, breaking the silence they’d allowed themselves to fall into. Oikawa takes another sip of water.

“Hm?”

“I… ah.” Ushijima thanks whatever god might be out there that they’re the only two Japanese nationals in the restaurant. “For ejaculating unprotected inside you.”

Oikawa flushes brilliantly. “You…! Well.” He averts his gaze, then, fixing it on the sweating glass in his hand. He’s silent, watching as a bead of precipitation rolls down and pools on the tabletop by his pinky finger. “Ushiwaka-chan, can I tell you something?”

Ushijima, who had gone back to reading his newspaper, doesn’t look up. “Of course.”

“I want a baby.” Oikawa’s stomach is tight with a sudden, unanticipated nervousness.

“I’m not going to get back into that again,” Ushijima says, as detached as he had been before. “We’ve already encountered the danger of using pregnancy as a sexual stimulant.”

Oikawa’s cheeks are warm and it has nothing to do with the heat. “God… that’s not what I’m talking about! This isn’t about the sexual side of things. I want a baby. I want to have a child.” He tries to hide the shaking in his hands by hiding them beneath the table. He can’t believe he’s saying this in a foreign, hot, crowded restaurant. The click of the old men’s backgammon board is suddenly very distracting.

Ushijima glances up, obviously having realised that Oikawa is onto something else. That little wrinkle has appeared between his brows again. Oikawa, despite his hands, feels strangely calm. His eyes lie steady on Ushijima’s.

“Ushiwaka-chan, I want to have a child with you."


	2. Intention

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey my dudes sorry this chapter is like a gazillion years late i've just lost my mojo so updates will probably be running a bit slow :') but if i don't update for ages please never feel like i'm abandoning this fic bc honestly i'd rather cut off my hand
> 
> anyway oikawa's got the baby fever
> 
>  **EDIT:** ok so i realised that minoru's name is actually supposed to be mitsuru!!! i've gone through the chap and fixed that up.

“He hasn’t said a word to you? For six hours?”

Oikawa paces up and down the breezeway outside the line of motel room doors, ready to tear his hair clean out of his scalp. His eyes track fire across the tiled ground and all he can hear is the sound of his teeth grinding together.

“Not one!” His voice is strained as he presses it into the phone. “He’s been ignoring me ever since… well. Ever since this morning.”

There’s a tapping from the other end of the line and Oikawa knows Iwaizumi is drumming his fingers on the nearest surface – it’s a habit he has when he thinks.

“What exactly _did_ you do?” Iwaizumi asks eventually, his voice tight. Hesitant. Even he knows that Oikawa must have done something _pretty serious_ for Ushijima to stop talking to him completely.

“I… it was nothing _big_. Just something stupid, honestly, Iwa-chan, it doesn’t matter.”

“ _Oikawa._ ”

Oikawa, coming to a halt in the middle of the breezeway, gnaws anxiously on his lower lip and mumbles into the receiver, face flushed with shame.

“What? Speak up, jackass, the signal is terrible.”

“I said I wanted a kid.”

Iwaizumi’s shocked silence is absolutely dreadful.

“See! Now you’re doing it, too! Say something!”

“God, Oikawa, I –,” Iwaizumi’s voice breaks off and then quietens, as though he’s moved his mouth closer to the speaker; Oikawa can hear the muffled sound of children in the background and realises Iwaizumi must have relatives over. “You told him that in a _restaurant_? I don’t think that’s something to talk about over breakfast, y’know, and this is _Ushiwaka_ we’re talking about here! He wouldn’t even know what to do with a baby!”

Oikawa sighs dreamily, muttering, “He sure knows how to make one, though…”

Iwaizumi’s disgust is practically palpable. “Too much information for me, please. What can you do –,” again there’s static, then a high voice shrieks so loudly in Oikawa’s ear that he has to pull the phone away from his head. “Oikawa-san, hello!” the voice shrieks, undoubtedly one of Iwaizumi’s numerous cousins. He waits as Iwaizumi wrestles the phone back, slams a door, and shrouds them once more in silence.

“He has to be better with kids than you,” Oikawa snickers.

“Do I have to come over there and kick your ass?” Iwaizumi bites back, but his tone grows soft soon after. “Maybe… I don’t know, but maybe it would be best to just let him wallow. He seems like a wallower. Plus, it’s not like he’ll dump you just because he doesn’t want a kid. As much as I hate to admit it, he’s worked too hard for too long to get you where he wants you. You aren’t worried about that, right?”

Oikawa’s heart has begun to beat so hard in his chest that his skin feels cold. “…I wish you hadn’t mentioned it.” But Iwaizumi is right. Oikawa knows he is. “So you think I should just let him _sulk_?”

“Well… yeah. Pretty much.”

“Iwa-chan, this is ridiculous. He’s a fully-grown man sulking. Iwa-chan! He’s almost _thirty_.”

“I had to deal with your sulking ever goddamn day of my life until you left for university, hear? I even have to deal with it now! You’re also a fully-grown man, jackass! You know what – I retract my earlier statement. Ushiwaka is probably very good with babies. After all, he has to spend every day putting up with you.”

 

* * *

 

 

In the end, Oikawa does allow him to wallow. It’s difficult and it’s tense, and after their first few days of furious lovemaking, the sex begins to sputter out and by the time they have to return for the closing ceremony Oikawa’s skin prickles at the mere thought of it. They can’t fuck when things are like this – there’s an unbroken line that neither of them deign to acknowledge. Oikawa, ideally, would love to take Ushijima by the hair and smack him around a little bit, demanding to know what exactly it is that he’s so afraid of. _Why_ isn’t he speaking? Why is he trying to pretend that everything is normal?

To Ushijima’s credit, though, he’d tried to keep up the momentum of the earlier days. But whenever he touched Oikawa it had been cold and stale and Oikawa’s skin had positively _crawled_. Did he think Oikawa wouldn’t notice?

During the closing ceremony Oikawa is bitter. Even though he’s standing on the podium with the heavy weight of the gold medal about his neck, a bouquet of bursting tropical flowers cradled in his arms – even though he’s in the very place he’d always dreamt of going – it’s all soured by the stoic man standing beside him, gazing out across the sea of faces as though he’s staring at a blank television screen.

Oikawa wants to slap him for it. He doesn’t, though.

The team notices it. An odd, chilly silence falls over the team as they head back to the village and lasts until they step onto their flight back to Japan; Oikawa is both glad and slightly sickened that he’s sat beside Ushijima, sandwiched between him and the window. It’s _tense_. Oikawa can feel the coach’s eyes burning into the back of his neck. But still nobody says anything.

Ushijima, naturally, doesn’t even _remotely_ suspect he’s doing anything wrong. He’d usually be able to pick up on Oikawa’s anxiety – he’s developed somewhat of an animal instinct when it comes to these things, but this time is different. He’s so caught up in his own tangled cocoon of inner conflict that he can barely manage to observe those around him; it’s always been that way. It’s why Ushijima is so adverse to any kind of extreme emotion – it’s most likely the cause of his single-mindedness, too, but he doesn’t give it much thought.

He’s too consumed by what Oikawa had said in that restaurant.

_I want to have a child with you._

Ushijima remembers how Oikawa’s face had been so divinely framed by the early-morning light, the ridge of his nose glistening with sweat and his hair curling into his eyes. After that all Ushijima can recall is an impossible coldness gripping the very core of his body, and even after days and days of mulling over _why_ that could have happened, he still doesn’t have an answer.

He wants to have a family. Of course he does.

…doesn’t he?

Until now it’s all seemed like a dream, a promise he could make until it faded so far into the distance it became forgotten. But Oikawa Tōru doesn’t forget things like this. Neither does Ushijima, for that matter.

“Are you tired?” Oikawa asks when Ushijima rubs a hand tiredly over his face.

“A little.” Neither of them look at each other. Their words are just as splintered as they had been before.

“Ushiwaka-chan,” Oikawa continues – somewhat unexpectedly – and lets his head loll lazily onto his shoulder so he can fix Ushijima with a gaze that reads _do-as-I-say-or-I’ll-castrate-you_. “Come help me with something, ‘kay?”

Ushijima hardly has a choice in the matter. Before he knows it he’s being hauled from his seat by Oikawa’s hand closed firmly around his wrist, tugged like a dog on a lead towards the business-class bathrooms. Thankfully there’s no staff there when Oikawa shoves Ushijima into the tiny room before stepping in himself and closing the door on them both.

The lock clicks shut and all Ushijima can smell is Oikawa.

“I promised myself that I’d wait for your little tantrum to be over,” Oikawa tells him in a low, biting voice, his face upturned to Ushijima’s in the tiny space. His breath blows across the ace’s lips, sweet as almond syrup. “But I’m at my limit, Ushiwaka-chan.”

Colour begins to rise on Oikawa’s neck. It peeks from beneath his collar and creeps towards his ears and Ushijima isn’t entirely sure why it’s there. Oikawa’s fist remains tangled in the front of his shirt, though, and the rim of the sink digs painfully into the small of Ushijima’s back.

“Are you so sickened by the thought of having a baby with me?” Oikawa continues. He’s smiling, but it’s a wicked smile, lascivious and thin. “You _really_ don’t want to put your baby in me? Well –,” he reaches up onto his toes, and if he was to move but an inch closer, his lips would slot perfectly against Ushijima’s. His voice drops incredibly low. It’s almost… sultry. “Maybe I’ll just have to find someone else to put a baby in me instead.”

Ushijima snaps like a twig.

His instinct is primal when it comes to other men laying their hands on Oikawa. Oikawa _knows_ this, too, but the fact that he’d used that to gain the upper hand on Ushijima doesn’t so much as occur to him. For the moment, Ushijima is consumed with rage at the thought of _somebody else_ planting a baby in Oikawa’s womb.

Because Oikawa is his.

Oikawa grunts when his head hits the little mirror, Ushijima’s hand fisted in his hair as he wrestles the setter over the sink. It’s so incredibly cramped that neither of them can really move, but somehow Ushijima manages to manoeuvre them around so he can press his swelling groin against the curve of Oikawa’s ass. The thought of Oikawa moaning and writhing and begging for another man’s cock – it makes him see red. His mind is growing fuzzy with anger just at the thought of it, making his hands clumsy as they fumble with Oikawa’s jeans, struggling to yank them down just enough to give him access to the setter’s hole. He plunges his fingers down Oikawa’s briefs, feeling about for the hot softness he’s grown to love so much; he finds it already wet. To Oikawa defence, of course, it _is_ pretty arousing to have two hundred pounds of solid muscle bending you over a sink. The setter thrusts back his hips, leaning his flushed cheek against the mirror and whining low in his throat. _This_ is what he’d been wanting so badly – Ushijima’s raw, brute desire.

It’s not as though he doesn’t enjoy himself when they have sex like a normal couple – it still leaves him groggy and gooey afterwards, but there’s a part of him that craves the primal violence of their earlier encounters, back when they both thought it was wrong but couldn’t help themselves. Unfortunately for Oikawa Ushijima is aware of his own strength and gets terribly afraid of hurting him if he treats him too roughly.

But Oikawa is, by nature, a tease. He knows just how to drag out the bits of Ushijima’s personality that the ace tries to bottle up, he knows how to rile up his inner need to dominate. This is one of those times. Nothing – absolutely _nothing_ – throws Ushijima more than jealousy. It isn’t the unhealthy kind, no, and even if it was Oikawa probably wouldn’t mind; it makes him tingle just thinking about Ushijima’s possessiveness. It borders on ownership. He wears Ushijima’s hickeys like a collar most of the time.

Most people Oikawa knows would probably be a little unnerved by having somebody snarl ‘you are mine’ in their ear. But most people aren’t Oikawa, and if there’s one thing he’s learned about himself in the years he’s been with Ushijima it’s that every time he says things like that or closes his big, rough palm around Oikawa’s throat, it’s a kick of pleasure to the groin. Oikawa is, for the most part, his own boss, and achieves captaincy in whatever he does. There’s only one person in the world who can overthrow him.

“You’re taking too long,” Oikawa pants as Ushijima roughly begins to finger him open, spreading the viscous slickness between Oikawa’s legs up over the nub of his clit and the quickly swelling folds. “Hurry _up_ or I’ll seriously – oo _ohmph_.” Oikawa’s teasing voice is broken off when Ushijima clamps his hand over the setter’s lips, muffling the sound of his moans and infuriating words.

“Shut up,” he growls, the seam of his jeans pressed against his achingly hard cock. There’s a cocktail of anger and lust broiling deep in his stomach. With the hand not over Oikawa’s mouth, Ushijima unbuckles his belt and pushes down his own jeans until his cock is free, lying heavy and sticky across the beautiful, creamy skin of Oikawa’s ass. He doesn’t have a condom, so he figures he’ll fuck Oikawa’s ass until the setter is a writhing begging mess –

_Maybe I’ll just have to find someone else to put a baby in me instead._

The words ring around Ushijima’s head. They remind him of funeral bells and make white-hot rage rear its head inside his chest, spreading an odd, chilling coldness over his skin. This was the kind of detachment he felt during their matches, usually when it was the match point. He looks down at Oikawa, who has his back arched and cunt spread, his body cramped and twisted in the tiny space, clothes askew and hair a mess already.

Ushijima pushes his cock down with his thumb, watching as the glistening folds of Oikawa’s cunt part to swallow the head of his dick. It’s always amazing to watch as the thick length of his shaft disappears inch by inch into Oikawa’s soft, slippery wetness, as though it has a pull of its own. He manages to push in about half-way before his patience snaps, and with one hand braced against the small of Oikawa’s back he thrusts his hips forwards, burying his entire length inside him.

Oikawa’s whole body is throbbing. He can feel each pore rise and the walls of his cunt _squeezing_ around Ushijima’s cock like it’s a lifeline. He’s thirsty, thirsty for aggression and thirsty for cum. Thirsty for Ushijima.

Taking one of the ace’s fingers into his mouth Oikawa begins to suck, pushing his hips back as he tries to fuck himself on the cock buried inside him. It feels so good stretching him out, hitting so deep inside him and rubbing against all the right places; his body is bent at such an odd angle that each thrust hits even deeper than the one before, sending icy cold shivers tickling up and down the setter’s spine. His cunt is dripping in need, sticky and heady and the air is thick with the smell of sex.

“Yes, y _es_ , _there_ –,” Oikawa moans, his voice muffled around the thick fingers in his mouth. Ushijima has to grasp his hip to stop him from jerking all over the place, holding him down against the edge of the sink as he fucks him. The thought of being caught lingers in the back of his mind, though, and it drives his thrusts sharp and rushed; while he can usually send Oikawa into insanity with a few calculated thrusts of his cock, the rough and clumsy fucking he’s giving him now is no less stimulating. He feels the setter melting in his arms, his body opening him up and his cunt sucking him in.

“ _Nobody_ else will have you,” the ace grits out. “Nobody else but _me_.” He’s angry – angry that Oikawa would even _think_ of getting a brat pumped into him by someone other than Ushijima. He’s so angry that it forces words from his mouth – usually Ushijima is silent during sex, but not now. Not when Oikawa’s threat hangs ominous in the air between them. “Are you such a fucking slut that you’d let anybody fuck a baby into you?” He slaps Oikawa’s ass hard, and the setter bucked forwards with a wan little moan, his entire body spreading open for Ushijima to claim.

Like hell if he isn’t going to fuck a kid into Oikawa’s pliant, submissive body. How could he not? How could he not plant his seed deep into such a fertile cunt – such a _thirsty_ cunt?

“Come inside me, fill me up,” Oikawa begs with a gasp, humping his hips back as fervently as he can against Ushijima’s. “Fuck me fuck me fuck me –,”

Ushijima pushes his hand against the soft flesh of Oikawa’s ass, spreading his cunt up and open so Ushijima can see the way it drips onto the floor and sucks around his cock. And then he cums, hard, holding himself as deep against the mouth of Oikawa’s womb as he can, releasing load after load of thick cum inside him. He hasn’t had a chance to do this for so long – to fuck him raw and come inside him – they haven’t done this since high school. Ushijima cums so _much_ that it begins to leak out and splatter on the floor.

When he pulls out, Oikawa slumps over the skin like a wilting flower with his cunt gaping open and flooded with cum. His thighs still quiver – Ushijima can’t help but drop to his knees, taking Oikawa’s thighs into his hands and slotting his face between them to lap up the delicious, wrecked mess of Oikawa’s fucked pussy.

“Oh Go _d_ –,” Oikawa chokes out, one hand tangling itself in Ushijima’s hair to push his face in further. “That’s so filthy –,”

But Ushijima doesn’t care. He’s too caught up in his haze to care about what’s filth and what isn’t, and all he can concentrate on is the swollen, fleshy mess beneath his tongue. Oikawa climaxes with Ushijima’s tongue bullying over his clit and two thick finger thrust unforgivingly inside him, cunt clenching to try and drink up whatever cum Ushijima hadn’t managed to suck out.

They come to their senses in silence; Ushijima dutifully helps Oikawa clean up, but he does it without a single word or a single kiss, which is what Oikawa finds the most disturbing. The throbbing in his abdomen suddenly doesn’t feel as good as it perhaps should. The two finally manage to slip back to their aisles with only a suspicious side-glance from one of the airhostesses.

Oikawa takes his seat, wriggling past one of his teammates so he can nestle up against the window and gaze out at the ocean again. He doesn’t so much as _try_ to hide the smug little smile on his face, nor does he smooth down his hair. He tugs his collar in the least subtle way his can and rights the rest of his clothes in a similar fashion; he wants everybody to know he just joined the Mile High Club.

Nobody is particularly disgusted with them; by now the team is used to their antics, but there are a few elderly women who shoot rather toxic glares at them from out of the corners of their eyes. Oikawa ignores them.

Ushijima, he’s glad to see, is not happy with himself. He sits stock still in the seat beside Oikawa, his hands on his thighs and his eyes locked almost comically on the blank screen before him. He doesn’t move nor does he speak – the only movement in his body is the pull and tense of his jaw muscles as he grinds his teeth together.

“Don’t do that,” Oikawa tells him, poking a sharp finger against his cheek. “You’ll get cavities.”

“Cavities only come from eating sweet things.”

Oikawa just can’t help himself; he leans in a little, batting his eyelashes. “Well, you just ate me, didn’t you?”

Ushijima stares at him and says nothing.

With a huff the setter sits back, folding his arms and pouting. “I thought your tantrum was over. And you call _me_ childish?”

“I am not having a _tantrum_.” Ushijima’s voice is tense. “You took advantage of me.”

Oikawa lets out a short hiss of breath through his teeth. “Took advantage of you? _Please_.” He huffs out a little laugh, but Ushijima isn’t entirely _wrong._ Oikawa had known just what buttons to push, and he’d pushed them.

Ushijima rubs a hand over his eyes and sighs. He sounds tired; he reminds Oikawa of an old man in that moment, and the setter pats the hand that still lies upon his thigh.

 

Oikawa sleeps for the rest of the flight, his head thrown back and his chest rising and falling softly with each even breath. It was a safe moment for Ushijima to look at him, to _watch_ him, to trace his eyes over the delicate features of the setter’s face and down the swanlike curve of his throat. He loves looking at him. He loves drinking in his beauty.

He traces his finger over the inside of the setter’s wrist, the tip following the faint blue vein snaking its way up towards his elbow. Oikawa doesn’t stir.

Ushijima loves Oikawa with each particle of his being. He always has, ever since he’d first seen him in middle school laughing and messing around with his friends during the volleyball preliminaries. The memory is burned in Ushijima’s mind; it had been spring, the stadium courtyard lined with cherry trees that had only just gone into bloom. Already their petals were becoming loose, though, and they’d swirled like a cloud around Oikawa when Ushijima had first seen him. He’d been a first year, then, tall for his age and lanky and taciturn. He’d lingered in the courtyard, just out of sight, watching the sight and wondering whether or not he was trapped in a dream.

Now he knows that it isn’t a dream.

He takes Oikawa’s hand into his own, stroking the pad of his thumb over the back of it. Oikawa’s clearly upset with him – Ushijima knows he didn’t hand the scene in the restaurant well, but what else could he do? When Oikawa had told him that he wanted to have a _baby_ , Ushijima’s mind had gone completely blank. Nothing came to him, no thoughts, no words. A cold chill of fear had spread across the back of his neck. Fear of what, though? Of being responsible for a child? Of something possibly going wrong? Or perhaps it had just been a gut reaction.

Either way, Ushijima was scared. He’d never admit it, but he’d gotten scared.

Closing his eyes he tries to imagine himself with a family. With Oikawa and a child, maybe two children, maybe more. He imagines them living in his house, filling up the empty rooms with little footsteps and the visceral laughs of little voices. With the gardens and the dogs and the mountain breezes that would lick through the open windows in the summer, stirring their babies’ fine hair as they slept soundly.

Ushijima releases his breath.

“You’re thinking too hard again,” says a sleepy voice from his right. Ushijima peels his eyes open and glances across to Oikawa, who’s looking at him from beneath heavy eyelids, his head lolling against his shoulder. Ushijima’s hand is still closed around Oikawa’s, and in that moment something is resolved, Oikawa’s hand tightening around his own.

 

“Tōru! Oh, look, there he is!” Oikawa hears his mother before he sees her; she’s waving her arms wildly from where she stands in the arrival bay. Oikawa’s chest swells with joy when he sees her, and he weasels his way through the cameras and journalists to throw his arms around her and hug her tightly. Beside her stands his father, his face calm, but when Oikawa pulls away from his mother and looks at him he sees something else there as well. It makes him pause, his heart beating heavy in his chest. His father raises his hand to Oikawa’s hair, his smile almost rueful, and ruffles it.

“I’m proud of you, son.”

Blood roars through Oikawa’s ears; he can feel tears spring to his eyes, and he scrubs furiously at them with the back of his hand. When his father hugs him he hugs back, so glad to be back in the arms of his family again.

“It’s the first time he called me his son, you know,” Oikawa says softly when he’s sat in a taxi with Ushijima; he’d moved in with Ushijima after they graduated college. He lays his head against Ushijima’s shoulder and sighs. _I’m proud of you._

“I believe he has warmed up to you,” Ushijima says. His hand is on Oikawa’s thigh, his thumb rubbing comfortingly circles into the material. “It has taken a while, and perhaps it will take a little more time, but I think he’s accepting you.”

 _Twenty-something years later,_ Oikawa thinks. _Oh well, at least it’s a start._

It used to get to him, he remembers it as though it was yesterday – but now he has his own life to live with a man who truly loves every single bone in his body and a volleyball team who’re as good as family to him. Things like his father’s opinion don’t torture him as much as they used to and he finds that once his hand is held fast in Ushijima’s in the darkness, it’s much easier to fall asleep at night.

Oikawa wonders why Ushijima’s mother didn’t come to the airport to greet them. She doesn’t seem like the type of person who would forget about something like this, but then again she wasn’t entirely predictable, either. By the time the taxi pulls up in front of the Ushijima house it’s a little past nine o’clock in the evening and the house is dark and silent, standing like a huge shadow in the cradle of the trees. The air is still, not a single lick of breeze, and the forest is alive and humming with creatures that thrived in the darkness. Oikawa had used to be scared of those, but now he’s grown used to them.

Ushijima takes both of their bags out of the trunk and carries them inside; Oikawa is the one who lets them into the house, tripping and stumbling through the dark. Finally a hand hits the light switch and the wide, low-ceilinged living room is illuminated. _Now_ Oikawa sees why Kaede hadn’t come to the airport – she’s slumped at the low table with her head cushioned on her arms and her shoulders rising and falling with slow, even breaths. The table is blanketed in papers full of numbers and tiny text, two calculators and a handful of ballpoint pens scattered thereabouts. The screen of her laptop is dark.

“Ah,” Ushijima murmurs and sets down the bags. He goes to his mother, levering himself to his knees beside her and placing a gentle, strong hand on her back. “Mom?”

“Hm?” Kaede stirs, shoulders arching and her dark hair spilling over her neck. “Wakatoshi?” Her voice is dreamy and she looks at him with unseeing eyes; when her gaze settles on his face, though, her eyes widen and she gasps, her hands clapping over her mouth. “Oh, no! I fell asleep when I was supposed to come and pick you up!”

“It’s okay,” Ushijima tells her as he helps her to her feet. She holds out her arms to him, and Oikawa stands in the doorway feeling more alone than he’s felt for a while. But when Kaede sees him her smile brightens and she opens her arms to him as well, drawing him into the warm knot of limbs and tangle of sweet-smelling hair. The three holds themselves together like that, Kaede making little half-sobbing noises as she strokes their hair and their faces.

“My boys are finally home,” she cries. They hug her tighter.

She sits them down for a cup of tea, clearing away her work into a cabinet by the altar at the north end of the room. Oikawa is unnaturally tense beside Ushijima; he can feel every tiny shift of his body, each swell of his breath, and while it usually makes him feel comfortable, now it only serves to make him uneasy.

“Mom? What’s all this –,” a voice breaks off as the living room door opens; Kaede looks up and Oikawa turns along with Ushijima to see a young man standing in the doorway. He’s tall and lean with dark hair and bright eyes that remind Oikawa of bottled sunlight.

“Mitsuru.” Ushijima says the name evenly, but his eyes sparkle. The young man waltzes into the room to sit down beside Kaede, leaning in on his elbows and grinning.

“The champions are home!” he says in a voice like a song. “Mom and I watched your match. It was _awesome_ – you guys killed it!”

The atmosphere in the room lifts and it feels like it’s daytime again; Oikawa had first met Mitsuru a few years ago when he’d come to Japan from America to visit his family. At first he’d been struck by his similarity to Kaede, but little by little he began to notice things that made him distinctly _Mitsuru._

But what struck Oikawa so curiously was that Mitsuru was like him. He was like him and yet Oikawa felt no different when in his company, no different than if he was standing next to any other young man. It comforted him, somewhat, to have one of his own kind ( _what terrible phrasing_ , he’d thought) around him. As reassurance, if anything.

Kaede makes more tea and the four of them sit up for a few hours recounting the events of the past few weeks. By the time eleven o’clock rolls around, Kaede looks as though she’s about to fall face-first onto the table, and so she claps her hands together and smiles ruefully around the table.

“You go help your brother unpack,” Kaede tells Mitsuru. “Tōru and I will clean up.”

As Ushijima and Mitsuru go to unpack, Oikawa helps Kaede gather up the cups and the teapot, taking them back into the kitchen to be rinsed out and left to dry.

The silence between them is odd. Kaede keeps glancing at him out of the corner of her eye and she holds herself as if she knows something is grating between Oikawa and her son.

“So are you going to tell me about it?” she asks eventually, handing Oikawa a cup that still has a few soap suds clinging to it.

“Ah…” Oikawa grimaces as he wipes the dish towel over the porcelain. He doesn’t really want to talk about it. He knows he has to, though. “I might have said something to Ushiwaka-chan that made him upset.”

Kaede hummed. “I noticed that he was acting a little differently. He never thinks his old mom will notice, but I see these things, you know! So.” Her eyes glimmer when she next looks at him. “What was it that you said? Fill this old woman in on the gossip, hm?”

Oikawa can’t breathe. His breath is stuck in his throat like a pill, and he can’t swallow it down for the life of him. When he speaks it comes out as a half-choke. “I told him I want to have a baby.”

Kaede drops the cup she’s washing into the sink. Oikawa flinches as it clatters noisily against the metal, but he doesn’t back down. Not for a second.

“A baby?” Kaede asks, her face open in wonder. “Tōru-kun, you want to have a _baby_?”

Perhaps he’d expected her to be glad. Maybe even supportive, at least – but looking into her face he sees only guarded concern. It makes his gut feel cold.

“Are… ah.” She passes a hand over her face and laughs. “I’m sorry, I must have frightened you! Don’t think I’m against it, dear, I’m really not. I understand why Wakatoshi is spooked, now.”

“Really?” Oikawa asks. “I don’t.”

She looks at him silently for a few moments before picking up the cup and rinsing it under the tap. She smiles down into the sink, but it’s a sad smile, one worn when reflecting upon a sad memory. “You see, Tōru, before Wakatoshi’s father left to go abroad, we got into an argument. He was never the settling kind, you see, and yet he had been the one who wanted to have a child. I… I didn’t really want to. I had my career ahead of me, you see, and I was worried about risking it for the sake of starting a family. When we had this fight I was so _angry_ that he had the gall to leave me with what he’d started. Not that I mind, of course – I love my boys with all of my heart, but when I was twenty and in the middle of a promising law career, having a baby was the last priority. I had to put everything on hold. I just… I don’t want you to have to do the same.” She clears her throat and doesn’t meet his eyes. “Anyway, about Wakatoshi – I think he feels the same. He overheard the argument between me and his father. He heard what I said to him, and even though I sat the boy down and explained everything to him, I think he’s still worried that you having a child would stall your potential. And out of anybody in this whole world, he knows your brilliance like nobody else does.”

All the cups sat on the draining board; the two of them stood staring out of the window above the sink into the impenetrable night beyond. Oikawa remembers the flare of jealousy Ushijima had shown on the plane when he'd been fucking him, the anger he'd raised by threatening to have someone else put a baby in him. His skin tingles at the memory.

“Do you really think he’s afraid?” Oikawa asks.

Kaede nods sadly. “But if there’s anyone who can help Wakatoshi overcome his fears, Tōru –” she takes his hand in hers and it’s cool and puckered against his skin “– it’s you.”

Oikawa’s face grows unbearably hot as he realises that having a baby with Ushijima Wakatoshi is something he’s seriously considering.

The revelation is like a slap across the face.


	3. Instigation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sup my dudes, today it is my birthday so i decided to upload this chapter as my birthday gift to you. because i love you all very much. so much.
> 
> alsooo i kind of want to advertise for a beta-reader to beta this fic, but i'm the Worst at organising shit like this so if anyone DOES perchance want to beta this, i apologise in advance. if ur interested either leave me a comment or send me an email at leryline@gmail.com ;) i feel so lame haha but yeah i'll fill u in on the details if u send an expression of interest.

It’s easy to fall back into the rhythm of things as they had been before.

In all honesty, Oikawa had thought it’d be hard. They’d been partly living in Tokyo for a number of years leading up to the Olympics and during the few short, intense months just before it, they hadn’t been back to Miyagi at all. They’d barely had the time to make phone calls between their training, eating, and sleeping. It had been a maelstrom of activity, hectic and confusing and invigorating. But now the swell has died down, the chaos receded, and Oikawa feels strange to be back in the quiet, calm lull of Sendai.

Oikawa wakes up first on the morning after their first night back at home. That in itself is odd for him. Ushijima is sleeping like the dead beside him, though, so fully asleep that Oikawa doubts even an airstrike would wake him. Ushijima must have been more exhausted than he’d thought.

The roaring of traffic and the muted hum of crowds is something Oikawa has grown very used to. But now there’s none of that, only a pressing silence and the faint thrumming of the mountains. He can hear every breath he takes into his lungs. He can almost hear the blood running through his veins.

Slipping out of bed, he wanders out of Ushijima’s second-storey room and heads down the stairs, stepping as softly as he can. The morning is still soft, clinging to the last traces of dawn, the silence partly due to the world being still asleep. Oikawa keeps one hand against the wall as he goes. Just to be safe.

He slides aside one of the shōji screen doors leading onto the front veranda where the dogs like to sleep. Sure enough, both of Ushijima’s dogs are lying sprawled on their bellied, their breaths coming in short huffs. Oikawa sits down near them and lets his legs dangle down into the long grass skirting the veranda. Ushijima’s old, sleepy Tosa Inu wakes first, his eyes blinking tiredly up at Oikawa; he rises on his old arthritic legs and pads over to him only to flop down again and lay his head over Oikawa’s lap. He closes his eyes again as Oikawa scratches behind his ear.

And so he stays like that for a while, just letting the cool morning breeze wash over his face and his neck, his hand warmed by Mamoru’s ears.

“You’re up mighty early.”

Oikawa starts at the voice that so suddenly appears from behind him, craning his neck as far as he could to see who’d interrupted his solitude. Mitsuru stands with his shoulder against the doorframe, his bright eyes appraising Oikawa with the smallest glimmer of laughter.

Mitsuru pads barefoot towards Oikawa and places down a hot cup of western tea by his thigh before sitting down beside him. Oikawa’s legs are longer than Mitsuru’s.

“I don’t have an excuse,” Oikawa laughs, waving his hand in dismissal. “Must be the change of scenery.”

Mitsuru’s dark hair hangs into his eyes, and Oikawa notices the habit he has of twisting the strands between his fingers when he’s thinking. “So. A baby, huh?”

A chill races down Oikawa’s spine; he turns from where he’d been about to take a sip of his tea to see Mitsuru with his knees drawn up to his chest, his cheek resting against a kneecap that gleams white in the early-morning sunshine. “Did your mom tell you?”

“No, I overheard.” Mitsuru blinks his gaze out towards the gate and to where the mountainside dips down to the rice paddies below. “Are you sure you’ll be able to?”

He doesn’t specify, but Oikawa knows what he’s talking about. _Hormones._ Oikawa had become so much more like he _wants_ to be these last few years; he’s grown broader and more muscled, his curves hardening into angles. But he knows what they do, and while his period still comes regularly it’s grown less frequent. He knows what it means, all right.

“I know. I’m in no hurry, though – I’m not even thirty yet, and even without the hormones I always looked like a boy anyway.”

“Are you thinking of going off them?” Oikawa notes a hint of concern in Mitsuru’s voice. “Is that… safe?”

“No idea.” Oikawa shrugs indifferently and offers the boy a bright, sunny smile. “But don’t worry. I’ll be all right – nothing’s impossible for me until I go under the knife, and even that’s not something I’m up for right now.”

Mitsuru, a small frown wrinkling his brow, reaches out and places both hands to Oikawa’s chest. “You’re flat, though.”

Oikawa can’t help but laugh; Mamoru is startled from his lap by the sound, and he huffs, going back to curl up in the sun-faded doggy bed by the door. “I’m just lucky,” Oikawa says. “I never had much there to begin with, and the hormones only made it flatter.”

“Lucky.”

 

When the rest of the household wakes up, Oikawa’s tranquil illusion is shattered. All notions of oddity are swept away in the wind and Oikawa finds himself able to slip into normalcy as though he’d never left. The way the house creaks and smells like old wood polish and paint is so painfully familiar that sometimes he just has to pause and drink it all in.

The next few days go quickly, Oikawa split between the Ushijima house and visiting his family and friends in Sendai. He knows Kaede is keeping a keen eye out for him, watching whatever interactions between Oikawa and Ushijima she can, her senses as keen as they’ve always been. Ushijima, at least, seems to be warming up to Oikawa again; with the talk of babies now forgotten he begins to morph back into his usual self, and no longer holds back his absent touches or the little kisses he likes to lay over the back of Oikawa’s neck. They have sex in Ushijima’s bed for the first time in years late on a Tuesday evening when Kaede has to stay late at the office and Mitsuru has turned in early for the night. Ushijima’s bed is full of old memories and sweet smells and all they can do is giggle and nuzzle at each other as though they’re teenagers again.

But Oikawa can’t let this thing go. He can’t just _not_ think about wanting to move on in his life. To move to the next stage. He’s achieved everything he’s ever wanted – an Olympic volleyball champion united with the one he loves unconditionally. He’d never expected he’d hit a roadblock like this, though upon further thought he decides that since it’s Ushijima he shouldn’t really be that surprised.

“I’m sorry, dear, but I’m going to have to stay in town tonight. Will you be able to take care of yourselves?” Kaede’s voice crackles down the telephone line; it’s a question she always asks, even though she knows that Oikawa and her son are more than capable.

“Absolutely,” Oikawa tells her. “Don’t worry about us. Call if you need anything, all right?”

She thanks him and then hurriedly hangs up the phone, leaving Oikawa standing alone in the kitchen. He hangs the receiver back up with a sigh.

The shower has shut off, so that must mean Ushijima is already in bed. Reading, most likely. Oikawa raises a hand to his mouth and bites down on his thumbnail, exiting the kitchen and flicking off all the lights as he goes.

“Ushiwaka-chan.” Oikawa shuts the bedroom door – Ushijima is reading, just like he’d predicted, his reading glasses slipping down the strong bridge of his nose. He turns a page and doesn’t respond. Oikawa climbs onto the bed with a huff, crawling over to knock the book out of Ushijima’s hands and straddle his lap. Ushijima, now absolutely unable to ignore his presence, looks up over the rim of his glasses.

“Ushiwaka-chan,” Oikawa begins again, “I know you don’t like talking about this, but we have to. I want you to give me a baby. You don’t have to agree, that’s fine, but just know that from here on out I’ll be poking holes in all of your condoms.”

Ushijima sighs in exasperation and takes off his glasses, laying them on the bedside table. His hands stroke up and down Oikawa’s thighs, an instinctive and familiar action made very easy by the fact Oikawa is only wearing a big shirt (Ushijima’s shirt, actually). “I don’t know if that’s legal, Oikawa.”

“Who cares? I’m a law-breaker. A free spirit. Look at me.” Oikawa’s teeth glimmer as he grins.

But Ushijima doesn’t seem to find it funny. He lifts Oikawa off him so they sit beside each other, straightening his back to look the setter dead in the eye. “We need to talk about this like adults, Oikawa.”

The setter grinds his teeth. “I tried, didn’t I? But you ignored me.”

“I… ah.” Ushijima rubs a hand though his hair. It’s such a boyish thing, Oikawa thinks; whenever Ushijima does it he looks ten years younger. “I admit I was a little shaken by the abruptness of that morning. This is… this is not something I have ever seriously considered.” He’d only ever thought of it in his dreams, but he isn’t going to mention that. “Oikawa, why do you want a baby?”

Oikawa, whose attention had been draw to a loose thread in the hem of his shirt, shrugs. “You… we’ve got everything, Ushiwaka-chan. We won gold at the _Olympics_ , for heaven’s sake!” Finally he looks up and Ushijima finds his wide, brown eyes swimming with tears. “I want to move on from that. I know you think of me as your teammate – as your setter – and –” he laughs bitterly and scrubs at presses the heels of his hands to his eyes “– _god_ , I never thought I’d say this! I feel like such a dunce. Ushiwaka-chan, don’t you understand? You’re _family_ to me.”

Ushijima’s heart thunders in his chest. He can barely feel his body; each pore rises along the length of his spine and the hairs on his arms prickle. His throat seizes, but he forces himself to speak. He reaches out and takes Oikawa’s hands away from his eyes, drawing the setter’s palms into his own. “Tōru, please look at me.”

Oikawa shivers at the use of his given name; it’s not a habit Ushijima has gotten used to just yet. He obediently raises his eyes, though, fixing them on Ushijima’s. The ace’s lips are slightly parted as though he’s about to speak, his golden eyes looking at Oikawa like he’s some sort of miracle.

“Are you sure? I don’t… I don’t want this to be some sort of power play like it was last time.” The disaster of their high school years still haunts him, Oikawa’s despair, all of it – he doesn’t want to risk either of them being unprepared. Not this time.

“Yes. I’ve never been more sure of anything in my entire life.”

Ushijima takes one hand from Oikawa’s and touches his cheek, running the pad of his thumb up beneath Oikawa’s eye. Almost instinctively Oikawa leans into his touch, his eyes fluttering shut.

Ushijima thinks about his dreams. He thinks about all those time he’d wondered what his and Oikawa’s child would look like, what colour their hair would be and what colour their eyes would be. He thinks of all those times he’d wondered what their life would like with an extra addition – maybe two. What their life would be like if they had a family of their own.

The revelation hits him like a sack of bricks and he exhales sharply, staring down at Oikawa’s beautiful hands.

“I want it.”

Oikawa stares wide-eyed up at him. “What?”

“I want to have a child with you.”

Oikawa’s face shatters in shock and breaks out into the brightest smile Ushijima has ever seen. He flings his long arms around Ushijima’s neck and practically throws himself into his arms, knocking them both back onto the bed in a plume of soft sheets and tangled limbs. Oikawa kisses Ushijima’s face all over, on his cheeks and his nose and the lids of his eyes before taking the ace’s face in his hands and pressing a delighted kiss to his mouth. He still can’t believe it – it’s going to happen.

“Are we really doing this?” Oikawa asks breathlessly. Ushijima nods and presses a kiss to the underside of Oikawa’s jaw, drawing the setter into his arms and holding him close.

“Yes.”

They’re going to do it. They’re going to have a baby.

Ushijima’s hands stroke up and down Oikawa’s back as the setter kisses him; his kisses grow slower and deeper, his eyes growing hooded as he gazes down at the man below him. He traces his fingers over Ushijima’s lips. “So… should we get right to it, then?”

It’s like something has exploded inside Ushijima. Fire tears up his spine and everything he’s tried to shove down and bottle up since their fateful mistake in high school shatters apart in his chest; finally Oikawa’s body will be completely his, his to own, his to _claim._ And what’s more, Oikawa trusts him enough to open up and submit his body to Ushijima’s touch. It’s like he’s only just realising that he has Oikawa in his arms, willing to have his child, willing to go through the discomfort and agony of it all, just for him. This is something that middle school Ushijima would never have dreamed of.

He draws a shaky breath in.

Sliding his hands up beneath Oikawa’s shirt, Ushijima presses back into the setter’s kiss. Oikawa hums happily at the return. He’s so glad to be here in his bed with the man he loves the most in the world; Ushijima rolls Oikawa onto his back and settles between his legs, kissing along the tender skin of his jaw and down his neck.

A shiver slips down Oikawa’s spine, making his voice quiver as it leaves his lips. “We have to… maximise the opportunity.” He manages to wriggle out of his shorts and his boxers, impatiently tugging off Ushijima’s clothes as well. When they’re both clad only in warm skin, Oikawa runs his hands appreciatively down Ushijima’s muscled body. He leans up and sinks his teeth into Ushijima’s collarbone, taking his time to suck a deep, dark hickey into the skin. “Mmh. You’re delicious.”

Ushijima pushes Oikawa down by the shoulders, fixing his eyes intently on the setter’s face for a moment before moving down his body. Oikawa loves when Ushijima looks at him like this – it’s like he’s fucking him with his eyes. It can be a nuisance while they’re in public, though, but in private it never fails to make him wet. Ushijima’s hands cup his face, and when he presses his thumb against Oikawa’s lips, Oikawa obediently takes the digit into his mouth and sucks at it, his tongue grazing over the underside. All at once Ushijima is reminded of all the magical things Oikawa has ever done with his tongue.

His finger pops out of Oikawa’s mouth wit a wet _pop_ , leaving his lips slick with saliva. He grinds his hips against Oikawa’s, feeling himself gradually growing harder and harder at the stimulation. They’re in no rush – besides, Ushijima wants to make the most of this moment.

Without warning he grabs Oikawa by the hips and lifts his abdomen off the bed. Oikawa squeaks in shock as Ushijima stuffs one pillow beneath his hips, tipping him back further so Oikawa can wrap his legs around his neck, and then adds a second pillow. Oikawa’s never been bent at such an angle before and it feels so strange that he can’t help but laugh – his chin is tucked into his chest, his knees over Ushijima’s shoulders and his heels grazing down the ace’s spine.

“What’d you do that for?” he asks. Ushijima rises to his knees, taking one of Oikawa’s legs in each hand and spreading them apart. The lamplight makes Oikawa’s skin glow golden. Ushijima presses his palm just over Oikawa’s mound, over his womb, and speaks in a low voice.

“It will stop anything from escaping.”

Oikawa flushes from his neck to his hairline.

“Are you gonna do it all for me?” he smirks, watching as Ushijima slips his hand between Oikawa’s legs and parts the perfect, puffy lips of his pussy. He looks at it like it’s some sort of delicacy – something he wants to devour. He looks _hungry_.

“Would you like me to?” Ushijima murmurs, pushing a single, thick finger between Oikawa’s folds. They’re sticky now that Oikawa’s body has started to react to Ushijima’s touch and it’s easy for him to push first one, then two fingers inside. Oikawa shivers at the familiarity of the gesture, letting Ushijima kiss his thighs and spread him open with his fingers; preparation is usually necessary (the one time they’d tried to have a quickie without preparation, something inside Oikawa had torn and they’d been unable to have sex for a month; neither of them want to repeat that again). Ushijima’s fingers are long enough to curl against his most sensitive places and it’s only a matter of minutes before Oikawa begins to squirm and moan and fuck himself down on the ace’s hand. Ushijima adds a third finger and the stretch is enough to sting.

“Hurry up,” Oikawa whines. “You always take too long. H-hurry up and fuck a baby into me, already!”

The words – the way Oikawa’s voice arches into such a high, desperate pitch – are like a kick in the gut. Ushijima can barely keep himself from fucking Oikawa half to death; he levers himself carefully over Oikawa’s elevated hips, letting his slick, hard cock push up between the setter’s folds. They’re glistening, now, kissing at the head of Ushijima’s cock.

“Stop teasing,” Oikawa begs breathlessly, but no matter how far he tries to arch his hips up he can’t get that cock inside him.

“Easy.” Ushijima hushes him with a comforting hand on his stomach, anchoring the setter to the bed as he slowly begins to breach his tight, hot cunt.

Oikawa groans and flings his head back as he’s slowly split apart by Ushijima’s dick, his eyes falling shut so he can fully embrace the sensations and the stretch. He blinks tears from the corners of his eyes, each muscle in his body seizing up. When the blunt head of Ushijima’s cock finally hits against his cervix, Oikawa keens and wraps his legs around Ushijima’s waist to yank him in closer.

Ushijima’s eyes are wide open and fixed on Oikawa. He can’t look away – he barely wants to blink. This is all too surreal. He’s about to fuck a baby into _Oikawa Tōru_. Oikawa Tōru is about to accept Ushijima’s child into his body. His skin begins to rise again, his organs shivering with a strange, icy heat. It still feels so _wrong_ , like they’re still supposed to hate each other, like this is something spawned from their raw, violent passion. Which, he supposes, it is.

“My beautiful Tōru,” he murmurs before he can stop himself; Oikawa practically purrs, reaching up to stroke Ushijima’s face.

“Say my name again.”

“Tōru. My Tōru.”

Oikawa sighs and kisses him, rolling his hips up until his swollen clit grazes against Ushijima’s pubic hair. The stimulation makes him gasp against Ushijima’s tongue, and he takes the appendage into his mouth and pulls it between his teeth to tangle it with his own. Ushijima kisses back as he begins to move his own hips, his hands cradling Oikawa’s thighs to lift him up into his lap. His first few thrusts are shallow, but as their kisses turn into open-mouthed pants he begins to move faster, the sound of slick skin slapping filling the room.

“F-feels so good –,” Oikawa gasps, his shaking hands scrabbling at the sheets for purchase, each thrust seeming to fill his entire body in a way it’s never quite done before. The angle his hips are in lets Ushijima’s cock slide in almost impossibly deep, stretching and filling him right to the brim to the point where it almost hurts. “Wakatoshi –,”

Groaning, Ushijima grinds the length of his body against Oikawa’s, wrapping his arms around him and pulling him in as close as he can. He wishes they could just melt together so he could feel every cell of Oikawa’s body… but, he realises, that’s exactly what they’re doing. By making a baby they’re becoming one, melting into each other completely. His love for Oikawa Tōru crests deep inside his chest, almost painfully, and he presses searing kisses all down the length of the setter’s swanlike neck. “I’ll make you mine…”

Oikawa has the nerve to laugh breathlessly at that. “D-dumb Ushiwaka… I’m already yours.”

Their sweaty foreheads press together as their bodies rock; the bedframe has begun to creak, but that doesn’t stop them.

“Yes.”

It’s all Ushijima says as he rears up between Oikawa’s gorgeous legs again, using one big hand to pin Oikawa’s arms above his head, the other yanking his hips back up to an almost painful angle. Oikawa can’t move, but he doesn’t really want to – he can’t even entertain the thought of moving right now, not with Ushijima’s thick, delicious cock pounding into his cunt and creating such a sweet, sticky mess. His eyes roll back in pleasure and he can only gasp for breath and jerk his hips up in an effort to get Ushijima as deep as he can.

“Wakatoshi _please_ –,” Oikawa can’t finish. The breath is being squeezed from his lungs by Ushijima’s hips as they grind against the swollen mound of his cunt, pressing the head of his cock hard against Oikawa’s womb.

Ushijima doesn’t say anything when he cums; his head falls forwards, strands of hair stuck to the sweat on his temples, his fingers biting painfully into Oikawa’s skin. The setter can _feel_ it as Ushijima floods him with cum – not a drop leaks out, either, mostly due to the angle of his hips and the fact that Ushijima is still thrusting, trying to push it as far inside Oikawa as he can.

Oikawa cums with a scream, his body curling in on itself and his thighs quivering, his cunt swollen and sopping and dripping with a mix of his juices and Ushijima’s. Each touch against his skin is stimulation, even the lightest of caresses, and he can’t help the tears from escaping the corners of his eyes and running down to the sheets.

They collapse together like a released breath. It’s uncomfortable and hot in their nest of sweaty sheets, but neither of them really mind, and Oikawa is still vey much caught up in a lustful haze; his eyes are glazed over and he holds his own hips up.

“Ah…” Ushijima’s chest heaves as he tries to get his breath back. “It’s coming out.”

Sure enough, Ushijima’s cum has begun to dribble from Oikawa’s thoroughly-fucked pussy. Oikawa lets out a displeased little sound at that, letting his legs fall apart so he can push a few of his own fingers into his hole, trying to plug up the cum and stop it from escaping. He ends up fingering himself, though, unable to resist the stimulation, his long fingers pressing and rubbing deliciously inside him. He closes his eyes and lets his body unfurl in bliss.

He doesn’t notice Ushijima climb back over him at first – he notices a shift of weight, but only when his wrist is pulled back and his fingers are replaced with a thick tongue does he come to full consciousness. His eyes fly open and he feels Ushijima’s hard cock against his cheek. They’ve never been in this position before, and it takes only a little strength on Oikawa’s part to direct Ushijima’s dripping cock to his lips, taking the head between them.

Sometimes Oikawa’s blowjobs are neat. Now is not one of those times.

He sucks at it sloppily, using his tongue and his throat rather than his lips. He’s only taken Ushijima’s cock completely down his throat a few times; usually the stretch is too much for even him to be able to bear. But this time he’s so clocked out by his arousal that his throat just _opens_ , letting the meaty cock slide right down. He gags a little bit, but that just makes it tighter, and Ushijima groans from where his head is dipped between Oikawa’s thighs. The ace slowly lets his hips drop, then rise, then drop, until he’s slowly fucking in and out of Oikawa’s pliant throat.

All Oikawa has to do is lie there and let Ushijima use him like a sex toy. It’s not as if he doesn’t enjoy it – in fact, very little makes him hornier than having Ushijima take him and _use_ him. That’s something only Ushijima knows.

Oikawa’s hips buck hard when he cums next, sweet liquid spraying from his oversensitive cunt and all over Ushijima’s tongue, which laps at it eagerly. Instead of Ushijima’s tongue scooping out his own cum, this time it had been pushing it back in deeper. Oikawa’s orgasm causes his throat to constrict around the cock in his mouth, and Ushijima lets his hips sink down and he moans low in his throat, filling Oikawa’s belly with more of his thick cum. When he pulls out some of it spills over the setter’s face, but Oikawa barely reacts with anything more than a moan.

Ushijima groans against Oikawa’s soft pubic hair when he cums, rutting his hips gently as the head of his cock slides against Oikawa’s cheek. He can’t help but breathe heavily, trying to let his head cool, laying his cheek against the setter’s thigh before glancing back between their bodies. “Are you all right?”

Oikawa lets himself breathe a little longer, then nods, stroking a reassuring hand up and down Ushijima’s thigh. “Never… I’ve never been better.”

Mustering whatever strength he has left, Ushijima pushes himself upright so he can lie down beside his lover again, gathering him into his arms.

When Oikawa sticks his legs up into the air and elevates his hips in his hands, Ushijima can’t help but burst out laughing. The sound is rich and deep like molasses and Oikawa lets his eyes slip shut at the sound. Ushijima never has laughed much, but when he does it’s the most beautiful sound in the world.

“What are you doing?” he chuckles, propping his head up on his elbow as he watches Oikawa’s long legs kick into the air. Oikawa – albeit from his slightly awkward position – shoots him a sidelong glance.

“I’m maximising the opportunity. _Duh_.”

Ushijima just grins at him. He’s used to the warm fuzziness during sex – or, admittedly, whenever he’s in Oikawa’s arms – but it seems stronger this time, as though it’s lingering inside him. His gaze travels from Oikawa’s knees to his navel, and he wonders whether or not it’s working. Whether or not he’ll finally find his way fully into the setter’s body.

After a few more minutes of jittery, intimate laughing at the mere ridiculousness of their entire situation, Mitsuru bangs the butt of a broom against the first-storey ceiling and yells at them to quiet down.

 

Oikawa wakes up sticky and crusty and feeling generally pretty gross.

Not that he dislikes waking up with Ushijima’s cum dried on his thighs – no, he likes that _very_ much, because it brings with it rather pleasant memories of the night before. But this time some of it is still wet, and his face is stiff from where he’d forgotten to clean it properly. Even the solid warmth of Ushijima lying beside him isn’t enough to keep Oikawa in bed this time.

He slips out of bed and pads naked to the bathroom across the hall from Ushijima’s room. He’s not really concerned about being caught naked, at least not up here – the only people who ever ascend the stairs to the house’s second storey are him and Ushijima, and Kaede whenever Ushijima forgets about something, which is rare.

Oikawa runs himself a shower and sets about cleaning off his legs and the leftover cum matted in his pubic hair. It’s never a nice experience, but it has to be done. He hums as he washes his hair and rinses himself off; by the time he’s finished Ushijima is already awake and pulling on his jogging gear.

“So I didn’t manage to exhaust you last night?” Oikawa purrs as he shuts the bedroom door, slinking over to Ushijima and running his palms up his chest and over his neck. Ushijima only chuckles and places a cool kiss against his lips.

“It’ll take a lot more than that to exhaust me. You know that.” Is Ushijima being _coy_? Oikawa cocks an eyebrow and kisses him again. “You can come with me, if you like.”

“No, no, Ushiwaka-chan, have you forgotten? It’s Saturday. I don’t do anything on Saturday.” He pouts, tipping his head to the side so his damp hair falls across his eyes, just _begging_ for Ushijima to gently stroke it away. Which he does. Because it’s terribly difficult to resist Oikawa this early in the morning. “After all the time we’ve been together you should know this by now.”

Ushijima smiles _that_ smile again – the one that shows only a little teeth, where his lip quirks endearingly, the smile that shows just how much he really does love Oikawa Tōru. He cups Oikawa’s face and places a _I can’t help it_ kiss to the corner of his mouth. “I’ll be back in about an hour and a half.”

“Don’t trip and fall in a ditch, Ushiwaka-chan!” Oikawa calls after him as Ushijima’s footfalls fade into silence.

Still humming, Oikawa drops his towel and changes into fresh clothes. He has an entire dresser to himself in Ushijima’s room, now; it makes the space a little smaller, but it was so open and empty to begin with that it really doesn’t make much of a difference.

“Good morning, Tōru-kun,” Kaede greets him from where she’s frying something over the stove in the kitchen. Oikawa, stretching, waltzes in and helps himself to a much-needed cup of tea.

When Oikawa doesn’t reply, Kaede turns, her bright eyes scouring his face. “Is something wrong, dear?”

Oikawa gnaws at his lip as his chest seems to swell; he can’t really hide his dawning grin behind the lip of his mug, and as his eyes begin to glitter, Kaede begins to frown.

“There’s something you’re not telling me,” she says, her eyes narrowing in that particular ways mothers’ eyes do, and Oikawa tosses his head with a cloick of his tongue.

“Well,” he sighs and takes another sip of his tea. “It’s nothing important.”

Her hand tightens around the handle of her frying pan. Oikawa grins fully at her and it’s like a bright burst of sunlight.

“Wakatoshi and I are going to try for a child.”

Kaede stares at him. Her mouth pops open and if Oikawa didn’t know any better he’d expect her jaw to fully drop to the ground. After a moment of silence she leans forwards, squinting as though she’d misheard him. A hand rises to press against her chest.

“A… baby? You two are going to have a baby?”

Oikawa nods. He can’t stop smiling.

He watches her face begins to open; it unfurls like a flower, her eyes widening and turning as liquid gold as he son’s in the morning sunlight. Her hands shoot up to cover her mouth, each wrinkle in her face leaking shock and delight.

She yanks him into her arms so fast that the cup is knocked from his hands; luckily it only clatters against the countertop, tea spilling but no ceramic shattering. Her hugs are incredibly tight, right to the point that Oikawa is almost unable to breathe. But when Kaede begins to laugh he can’t help but laugh as well, and he hold her, his face cradled in the crook of her shoulder. She hasn’t put on perfume yet; she smells like Ushijima a little bit, with whispers of pine and the call of the deep ocean.

“Oh,” she gasps and pulls away. She takes Oikawa’s face in her hands and looks at him through teary eyes, stroking her thumbs over his cheeks. “Oh, Tōru, I’m so happy. I’ve always wanted grandchildren! How on earth did you convince that bone-headed son of mine?”

Oikawa grins and clicks his tongue. “He came around eventually. You can grill him when he gets back.”

Kaede grins at him. Oikawa swears he’s never seen her grin so widely. She looks just like her son. After another moment between them Kaede pats his chest and goes to hand him the landline. “You should tell your family, too.”

Oikawa’s smile freezes on his face. Tell his family? He hadn’t even thought about that. Thinking about it now is doing nothing more than tying his stomach in knots.

He takes the phone and plugs in the number.

“Tōru!” his mother calls gleefully down the line. “Oh, I’m so glad you called. I miss you! You ought to come and see us sometime.”

Oikawa swallows dryly. “Sorry, mom, I’ve been busy!” _Get it over with. Just do it. Tear off the band-aid, kid._ “Hey, I have some news.” He’s painfully aware of Kaede standing at the stove behind him; she’s humming as she cooks, but Oikawa knows she’s paying attention all the same.

“News?”

“Yeah.” Oikawa draws in a shaky breath. “Wakatoshi and I are trying for a baby.”

The silence that follows isn’t _bad_. It’s not shock or dread, but it’s hardly as positive as Kaede’s had been. But when his mother speaks again he voice is warm and soft and as sweet as he remembers, and he knows that she’s happy, she really is.

“Tōru, would you like me to tell your father?”

She’s hesitating. Oikawa is hesitating, too. Neither of them knows why. Both of them hate it.

“Um…” Oikawa pinches the bridge of his nose between his fingers, leaning on his elbow against the wall and curling over the receiver as though he doesn’t want Kaede to hear _anything._ “Could you put him on the phone?”

His mother hums in assent and tells him that she loves him. Then there’s a clatter. Then silence.

“Hello?” Oikawa’s father says into the phone, his voice painfully formal. Oikawa flinches and rubs his eyes. Something that had been so joyful only a few hours ago is now proving to be more agonising than it’s really worth.

“Hi, dad, it’s me.”

“Ah.” Silence. It’s awful. Awkward.

“Could we meet up sometime? For lunch or something?”

His father sounds shocked even through the silence. “Yes. Of course.”

A few more vapid words pass between them before Oikawa makes up some meek excuse to hang up. When he replaces the phone in its cradle on the wall, Kaede has gone, and he rests his forehead against the wall, wishing he’d never told anyone in the first place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> idk if it's just me but i keep hearing mia farrow's voice from Rosemary's Baby saying 'we're going to make a baby' whenever i write shit like this it's wild
> 
> if ushi and oikawa have a kid, it will not be the literal spawn of satan. I promise.


	4. Implication

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just wanna say thank you to everyone who contacted me re: beta reading!!! i also wanna say a big THANK YOU to [kuroimachi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kuroimachi/pseuds/Kuroimachi), who ended up being the Chosen One to review the hot mess that was this chapter pre-beta. ilysm ♥

He’s been trying his hardest not to think about it. He knows thinking about it too much is dangerous – after all, Oikawa has always been prone to overthinking things and he _knows_ that it’s bad for him. He knows that it only makes matters worse, that he effectively manages to drown himself in imaginary problems. He knows he shouldn’t think about it, and he’s been trying his hardest not to. But he can’t help it. This isn’t one of those things he can just _not_ think about.

He still remembers the argument he’d had with his father in his final year of high school very clearly. In his early college years, he would wake in the early hours of the morning drenched in a cold sweat, freezing and alone and afraid and wracked with guilt to the point that he’d collapse over the toilet bowl, his entire body heaving. When he’d moved in with Ushijima a few years after that the sweats were still there and sometimes he’d wake up seeing white – but it helped to have a broad, dry palm pressed against the sweaty column of his spine or the side of his face. He’d be lying if he said that hearing Ushijima’s voice through the darkness hadn’t calmed him. But the pain and the fear and the guilt were still there.

In a way, Oikawa is eternally grateful that he doesn’t have to hide this from Ushijima. After all, the fight he’d had with his father had been the entire reason they’re here now, living together, champions, and very much in love. But the comfort Oikawa knows he’s supposed to feel – the way his breath escapes his lungs when he thinks of how lucky he is that Ushijima had caught him suffocating in the locker room during training camp – is still tempered by the guilt. He’d destroyed one relationship in lieu of another, and that isn’t something he can allow himself to forget about.

As a child, Oikawa had been close to his father. Their family was a tight unit bound by unconditional love. Well, Oikawa had _thought_ it was unconditional. It had been him, his mother, his father and his older sister, and that had been all they’d needed. A _family_. Oikawa had been happy then, when his father took him to amusement parks and bought him ice cream and won him prizes at the stalls lined along the boulevard. He remembers those days being bright and fragrant and full of colours. Whenever he smells the slight bite of rubber from helium balloons he’s reminded of them, and it tugs at his heart. He wishes he could go back to them again.

It’s strange, he thinks, that he doesn’t remember the crazed rage that flashed in his father’s eyes _that_ day. In fact, when he thinks about it he realises that there’s very little he remembers about that fight at all – the memories he has are all of his father’s eyes wrinkling as he smiled, or the curious coolness of his palm whenever he’d held Oikawa’s (always hot, always sticky) hand as a kid. He’s bitter, sure, but he isn’t angry. He’s upset that his father sees him as an _it_ rather than as a _who_.

Ushijima – to his credit – had never asked about any of it. Oikawa knew that Ushijima was aware of the rift between Oikawa and his father; how could he not be after what had happened at the training camp? But he’d never asked about any of it, and Oikawa was grateful for it. It’s that particular sort of silent concordance between them that he’s always really loved – Ushijima would let him speak in his own time and would never push him into something he isn’t ready for.

Oikawa had told him, eventually. After all those nights of cold sweats and Ushijima’s concerned touches, he felt like he owed him at least an explanation.

He’d told him about it in the summer, during the early evening when the sun was still warm and golden and they lay stretched out abreast on the veranda at the back of Ushijima’s house. The sun warmed the wood and made the grass fragrant; the air had been thick with the smell of soil and sweating bamboo. He’d told Ushijima about he and his father with his eyes still closed and his hands folded over his stomach. He wasn’t even sure if Ushijima was awake – not, at least, until he’d opened his eyes and had seen the tears gathered in the very corners of Ushijima’s eyes. Again that broad, dry palm found his cheek, and Ushijima’s thumb had stroked the delicate skin beneath his eye. He’d told Oikawa that he loved him, then, in a very deep and very quiet voice. That had been when Oikawa had started crying, rolling across the warm wood to curl into Ushijima’s arms.

 

If there’s one thing that Oikawa Tōru knows about himself it’s that he can’t let things just _wallow_.

 

He doesn’t tell Ushijima his plans at first. Sure, Ushijima has probably already guessed that something’s up – Oikawa is visibly ticking with nervousness and he _knows_ he is; if the sidelong glances Ushijima is giving him are anything to go by, he definitely suspects. But he doesn’t ask. It’s only when Oikawa spends a solid half an hour pacing up and down the length of the living room that Ushijima finally cracks.

“Oikawa.” Ushijima sets down the little ceramic bowl smoking with fresh incense on the family altar. He puts his hands on his hips and turns to face the setter, who bristles at the sound of his name, but doesn’t stop pacing. Ushijima’s eyes follow him, up, down, up, down. “Stop that.”

“Stop what?” Oikawa asks, not stopping. His feet pad silently over the tatami mats. “I’m not doing anything.”

Ushijima crosses the room in a few long strides, closing his hands around Oikawa’s upper arms and pulling him tight against his own body, locking strong arms around Oikawa’s waist to keep him there. Oikawa can’t help but grin when Ushijima’s eyebrows rise expectantly, as though asking _so are you going to tell me or what?_

He’s always been a good distraction.

Oikawa laces his arms around Ushijima’s neck and places a kiss on the underside of his jaw, but Ushijima is having none of it.

“Don’t try to distract me,” he chides, but his nose bullies behind Oikawa’s ear all the same. “Tell me what is bothering you.”

“ _Nothing_ ,” Oikawa insists, but Ushijima’s smell and feel makes it very hard to lie. “Okay, well… maybe something. There might be something.”

Ushijima pulls back from nuzzling Oikawa’s neck and looks down at him with those even eyes of his, and immediately Oikawa’s heart settles, and the nervous heat in the back of his neck begins to cool.

“So are you going to tell me?”

They end up sitting cross-legged on the floor of the living room, the comfortable mountain breeze licking against the backs of their necks. Oikawa stares down at his hands for a few moments before glancing up at Ushijima.

“I’m going to meet my dad,” he says, and he hates how his voice shakes a little as he does. “I… I need to talk to him. About everything.”

It’s all he needs to say. Ushijima nods placidly – it reminds Oikawa of those big, gentle cows he’d seen once on a field trip in middle school – and leans back on his hands, not once taking his eyes away from Oikawa’s.

“What I understand,” Ushijima begins, “is that what has happened between you and your father has been slowly eroding a hole inside of you that now, I suspect, is rather large. I know you don’t like showing it to me.” He tilts his head to the side and something in his gaze changes – it’s something that makes Oikawa flush a little, as though those swimming gold irises are cutting right through him. “I am glad you’ve finally decided to do something.”

Oikawa licks his teeth. “This makes me uncomfortable.”

A beat of silence passes between them before Ushijima’s expression changes. At first he looks a little hurt – perhaps at the thought of Oikawa being uncomfortable opening up to him. But he knows better than to assume that Oikawa would say something so thoughtless. “What does?”

“That you can see right through me! You still confuse me and yet you’re able to read me like a damn book.” As Oikawa complains he crawls across the short space between them, right into Ushijima’s lap, where he drapes himself over the ace’s strong body. “It isn’t fair, you’re a bastard, and it makes me uncomfortable.”

Ushijima lays a kiss to the end of his nose and Oikawa makes a gagging noise at the tenderness of his gesture. He still isn’t used to this.

 

* * *

 

 

“So have you organised a date yet?”

Oikawa lets the water wash the soapsuds from his cup before placing it on the draining tray beside the sink. Flinging the dish towel over his shoulder he turns around and folds his arms, sniffing and fixing his gaze on the back of Ushijima’s neck. Ushijima is sat at the kitchen table, his fingernails glistening as he peels the rind from an orange.

“Well… yes. I mean, I said lunch, and I know there’s a little café near my house where he likes to go.”

“When is it?” The rind falls away from the orange and Ushijima licks at his fingers.

“Tomorrow.”

The more Oikawa thinks about it the more he dreads it. So, of course, he tries not to think about it – but it’s hard with Ushijima’s interest. Still, it stops him from forgetting about it completely, at least. He pulls out a chair with a huff and sits down, taking the handful of sweet orange segments that Ushijima passes to him.

“I believe you will be fine.”

Oikawa scoffs through his mouthful of orange. “Thanks, Ushiwaka-chan! You never told me you could see the future.”

Ushijima lets out a small huff of laughter.

 

* * *

 

 

“I can drive you,” Ushijima says as he fixes the lopsided collar of Oikawa’s shirt just before he leaves the house. Something in his voice is unnaturally tight, and Oikawa realises, only when he’s putting on his shoes, that Ushijima is almost as nervous as he is.

“No, I’ll be fine,” Oikawa assures him.

He isn’t sure, though.

 

* * *

 

 

The train is oddly quiet.

It’s just after noon on a Monday, though, so Oikawa isn’t entirely surprised. Not many people come to this part of Miyagi on Mondays, not unless they’re farmers returning from the city or women laden with armfuls of shopping bags. The only company he has is an old man sat down the other end of the carriage, sleeping like the dead with his head tilted back and his leathery, brown skin catching the sun like the brass lip of a bell.

Oikawa stares down at his hands for most of the journey. Should he have brought something? He feels strangely empty and lost, but he tries not to think too much of it.

He’d called him _son_. Back in the airport, when he’d gotten home from the Olympics, his father had called him _son_. That, at least, had to be a start – didn’t it? It’s a tiny thread of hope Oikawa is more than willing to hold on to, proof that maybe something has changed over all these years, that as his father’s skin gradually softened perhaps his heart had as well.

Oikawa draws in a shaky breath and finds that he can’t bring himself to release it. God, he’s _scared_. He’s so scared. He should never have done this – he should have just let things be as they were before, because he’s sure that the heartache he’d felt for the last decade is _still_ better than what he’s feeling now.

The train pulls into a familiar stop before he can change his mind. He stands on the platform with sweaty palms, clenching and unclenching his fingers at his sides. He has hazy memories of this place, back from when he’d been in high school; memories of sticky summer uniforms and Iwaizumi’s fist tight in his hair as he’d half-dragged him away from the girls clustered like pretty bunches of flowers outside the train doors. But today the platform is as empty as the train had been, smelling faintly of bleach and new rubber.

Oikawa feels bloated with memories as he walks from the station to the café he’d arranged to meet his father at. He’d come here all the time as a kid, back before he’d reached that awkward phase of wanting to look cool and going to the more ‘hip’ places like McDonald’s and various other fast-food chains in the city.

It’s a lane that sneaks between two old blocks; the walls on either side of the lane are high and windowless, though the stained grey stone is broken here and there by verandas bursting with geraniums and bougainvillea vines climbing up the rain pipes. He can hear the faint whisper of a bamboo broom wishing and washing somewhere in the distance and immediately envisions the old crooked war widows with their pockets full of barley sweets and blind, wrinkled eyes.

The lane opens onto a small avenue lined with immature maple trees, their arms waving towards the sunlight, leaves fat and waxy. The avenue is popular with young families and old women that still wear wooden sandals as they spin their parasols in the summer sunshine.

He feels strange here now. He’s not the same person he was last time he came here, not in body and not in mind. The old shopkeepers who used to sneak him free baked treats wouldn’t recognise him now – not as the same child who would stand on his toes in a pale cotton sundress with hands grasping and eyes shining.

Or maybe they would. He can’t be sure.

The café he’s looking for is nestled at the head of the avenue between a copse of maples and a small boutique selling old-fashioned Japanese sweets. It’s just as he remembers: arching high and white into the sky, with eaves that have sagged only a little over the years. It’s vaguely European in style, built back when the West was all the rage, and the white paint reminds Oikawa of the frosted cupcakes they’d bought in Paris once.

The sun beats down warm against his neck and he’s relieved when he ducks into the café, the tiny silver bell above the door tinkling as he enters. The sound is familiar to him and he shivers at the sound of it.

“Ah… Tōru. You came.”

Oikawa tears his gaze away from the brass doorhandle to look to his left, where his father is sitting in one of the deep wicker chairs by the front bay window. He’s gazing at him easily, hands folded and legs crossed; Oikawa glances at his watch. He isn’t late.

“Of course I did,” he replies. His father gets to his feet, smoothing down the front of his shirt and gesturing to one of the waitresses to show them to their table. Oikawa shoots a long glance at his father, whose face is relaxed and whose shoulders are as loose as ever. He can’t tell what he’s feeling, what he’s thinking – but then again, maybe he can’t tell what Oikawa is thinking either.

They sit down beside a large French window overlooking the café’s small garden, complete with a bamboo fountain and a tiny pond packed full of lazily drifting goldfish. Oikawa remembers sneaking out through a kitchen vent to stick his hand in the writhing mass of gold scales.

“Well,” his father begins, crossing one leg over the other and gazing out the window. “I’m glad you’re home safe.” Something is off in his voice – his voice is too tight, too controlled. Oikawa picks up a menu and tries his best to smile.

“I’m glad too. It’s nice to be home again.”

As he looks over the little card in his hand, he becomes aware of his father looking at him. He lets him look – he probably needs time to get his thoughts in order, since both of them know that they’re not here for idle chatter.

With a sigh, Oikawa’s father leans forwards so his elbows rest on his knees. The table between them is low and small, built for casual coffee dates rather than meals, and their chairs are as deep-seated as armchairs. He gazes at his son with his short hair and long eyelashes and sun-darkened skin, at the pale freckles almost invisible over his nose. At his long fingers. And he remembers all of it, right from when he’d first seen those bright, alert eyes in the hospital delivery room. “Let’s not beat about the bush any longer, then. I know you, Tōru, and you’re just as bad as I am when it comes to ignoring problems we hope will go away.”

Oikawa puts down the menu card and tucks his hair nervously behind his ear, a habit he’d thought he’d left in his childhood. “So you acknowledge that it’s a problem, then?”

The look his father gives him is pained. It’s the look of an old man who’s lost something he loves – Oikawa realises it to be tired, tired anguish. It makes his mouth go dry.

“It’s been almost ten years, Tōru. Do you think I could look at your face and not realise my mistake?”

 _His mistake_. Oikawa had been so worried that his father would be one of those people who refuse to admit their mistakes – but then again, his father had never been one to hold onto arrogance. He isn’t _bad_ , Oikawa realises; he’s always worked his hardest for his family, but coming from fresh post-war Japan was always going to impact his philosophies, _especially_ concerning the fact that his son turned out to be transgender… something other than what everyone believed he should be.

Oikawa tries to speak, but his mouth is too dry to make any noise; the waitress comes along with a tall bottle of water and glasses, though, so after taking a reluctant sip, Oikawa clears his throat and tries to gather himself together. This is even harder than he’d imagined it to be.

He half wishes his father had turned out to be an arrogant prick. It would be a lot easier if he turned out to be a villain, if Oikawa had been able to kick and scream and cry at him – in a way, Oikawa would be justified. But to see his father morph into something like that would undoubtedly shatter his heart into a million little pieces, so for that he’s glad.

“Do you remember your grandmother, Tōru?”

Oikawa squints as he tries, scratching at the back of his neck. His grandmother – on his father’s side – had died when he was still in elementary school, so he remembers very little of her. As he tries to think back, he gets flashes of tight lips and powdered skin and kimonos wrapped far too tight. He remembers lightless New Year’s Eves and something bitter – or maybe it’s the absence of anything sweet.

“She was hard,” he laughs. “A hard woman.”

His father nods his head, the sunlight catching the silver in his hair and making it gleam. “You see, Tōru, what you must understand is that it’s difficult for old men like me to grow used to this age. What I was taught by my mother was ingrained into me from birth until I married _your_ mother, and even after that. As much as men believe they run the world, our lives are held together by the women we know, more than most people ever truly realise. I understand that no belief is instinct, but such things have been so entrenched that they become reflex. I’m not trying to excuse my actions, no – but if you could possibly find it in your heart to forgive me, then I believe we could move on.”

Oikawa’s eyes are on fire; he stares vacantly at a spot on the wall, not daring to blink, hardly daring to move. His father gazes at him forlornly, seeming years older than he really is. When Oikawa doesn’t reply, he speaks again, this time impossibly soft.

“I haven’t been sleeping right since then, Tōru,” he confesses, his voice oddly strained. “Nothing’s been right since then.”

“That’s easy to say, though, right?” Oikawa asks, his voice shaking to the point where he flushes in embarrassment. His father frowns and makes to speak, but Oikawa stops him before he can. “You don’t have to change anything. The most you have to do is to _try_ and change the way you think. What about me? How do you think I felt back then? I’ll tell you – I felt like my world was tearing apart right in front of my own damn eyes. I was still a _kid_ , dad, I was still in high school!” His nose feels blocked and his eyes burn, but he still doesn’t blink, not unless he wants the tears to start falling. The next few words leave him in a rattle. “I felt like I was dying.”

And if it hadn’t been for Ushijima, he thinks, he probably might have.

When the waitress comes to take their orders, Oikawa turns his face away and doesn’t speak. He knows his voice will snap if he tries.

“An Americano and a chai latte, please.”

Oikawa fights back a sob; they’d come here once when Oikawa was thirteen and wanted to try coffee for the first time. The latte had been what he’d ordered. He’d never expected his father to remember, but little did he know that that memory was the one the old man cherished the most.

“Why are you doing this to me?” he asks through gritted teeth, pressing the heel of his palm to his right eye and feeling moisture smear across the skin.

“It’s been ten years, Tōru. Even old men like me can change in that much time.”

Oikawa finally looks up, his nose and lips and eyes flushed and raw. “What?”

“I called you my son at the airport, didn’t I? Do you take me for a liar? And for me to do it as a taunt – I may be old, but I’m still your _father_ , and I always will be. You could decide you wanted to be a dolphin and I’d still love you.”

Oikawa grits his teeth so hard he expects them to shatter; he can’t cry, not _here_. He points a shaking finger at his father, eyes narrowing. “How _dare_ you,” he begins with a sniffle. “How dare you come in here and be _nice_ to me when I was expecting you to disown me? Huh?”

For the first time, his father smiles. It’s everything Oikawa remembers and more – the lines in his face deepen and he cradles his chin against his hand, his black eyes glittering in the sunlight that catches the bridge of his nose. He smiles and Oikawa knows that everything – somehow – will be all right.

“I watched you at the Olympics. I cried, you know, when I saw you on that court. I cried and when your mother asked me _why_ I was crying, I told her it was because I realised that that was my son out there representing his country for all he’s worth. And I never truly realised I had a son until then, not really.”

Oikawa is so shocked that he can’t even cry. His hands go numb on his thighs and he just _stares_.

“And this Ushijima boy…” there’s a tone in his father’s voice that just screams _I know_.

“We’re a thing,” Oikawa replies weakly. “Sorry.”

“Why are you apologising? You need someone to rein you in, I think, otherwise you’ll just outdo yourself. Something like Hajime does, but more than that. That Ushijima seems like a good fit.”

Oikawa is staring again. “You… you don’t mind?”

Again, his father smiles that old smile. “Of course I don’t mind. After all, I’m trying to change, aren’t I? It might take some time to undo fifty years of conditioning, but I think I’ll manage. And I won’t get anywhere by not accepting you for who you are – I can’t think of anything more stupid than sacrificing my own flesh and blood for something like this. I put far too much effort into you to drop you now, kid.”

He can’t help but laugh; it’s a weak, watery laugh of relief, but it’s a laugh all the same, seeping down through Oikawa’s bones like the sun after an eternal winter. He feels warm again, as though he’s only just seen colour for the first time. Their drinks come and Oikawa has to hide his face again, though this time not to conceal his tears, but merely the pleased flush creeping up his neck. He only has one things left to do.

“Ushijima and I are going to try for a family,” he says, forcing the words out before he can stop himself. He knows his father will find out somehow, and he’d prefer to be the one to tell him.

Oikawa’s father shifts in his seat, looking more amused than annoyed, but still a little uncomfortable, and a whole lot confused. “I thought you were a boy. I thought boys didn’t have babies.”

For some reason Oikawa doesn’t feel bitter. His father doesn’t _know_. None of this has ever been explained to him, and for the first time in his life, Oikawa becomes the teacher and his father becomes the student. “See… he’s given me so much. He loves me more than I ever asked for and I love him in return. I _want_ this part of it – it’s the only thing I’m willing to retain. Even though I’m a boy, I’m not going to throw an opportunity like this away. There are so many people in this world who love each other in happy homes who can’t _have_ children. I’ve been given a gift, and I’m not going to just let it whither away.”

“You’ll have to clean up the vomit, you know.”

Oikawa laughs; the sound feels like the exhalation of disease, of every single bad, agonising emotion he’d held these last ten years. Everything is suddenly very all right again, all patched together. He knows everything is still delicate, but for the first time since that fateful argument, things are looking up again. Maybe – just maybe – they could be a proper family again.

 

The rest of the afternoon is consumed with idle small talk and easy chatter; Oikawa doesn’t want to stop talking, not now that he can look at his father and smile so effortlessly, not now that he can stop holding himself back for fear of bringing out that cold, unforgiving scowl. But soon enough they have to leave, the sun beginning to sink behind the shimmering eaves of the avenue shops. Awnings are beginning to be rolled in, tables wiped and signs collapsed, the avenue gently closing down for the day. Oikawa’s father walks him to the station, but just before Oikawa makes to get on the train he stops him.

“What’s this?” Oikawa asks when his father presses something cold and hard into his palm. He peers down at it – it’s shiny, made from steel and leather with a face only slightly cloudy. It’s a wristwatch. It’s a very old wristwatch. When he turns it over he sees something etched on the back, but the varnish has been rubbed away, rendering the text illegible.

“‘Wings can take you only so far as you wish to soar’,” his father says. “It was my father’s. He was a kamikaze pilot in the war – apparently he flew his plane into a wave over the Pacific rather than killing any others. This was all we got back of him.” Gently, he closes Oikawa’s fingers around it. “I always meant to give it to my son. You keep it safe for me, now, and who knows.” The smile he gives Oikawa is wrinkled and a little sad. “Perhaps one day you’ll give it to your son, too.”

Oikawa’s eyes begin to burn again. He closes his fist around the watch and throws his arms around his father’s shoulders, holding him tightly. He can feel all the familiar twists and turns of his body and smell the smells of home, of his mother’s cooking and the sheets of his parents’ bed. He’s _home_ , he’s family. They’re finally family again.

“I love you, Tōru. Please never forget that.”

Oikawa ends up crying the whole way home.


	5. Inspiration

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so like imo there was FAR too much plot development and not enough porn. so i decided to fix that.
> 
> ALSO please look at [this gorgeous ushioi](http://moekou.tumblr.com/image/149971754353) drawn by [citrusyghost](https://archiveofourown.org/users/citrusyghost/pseuds/citrusyghost) because i am in love and need everybody to see it

Ushijima is concerned. Of course he’s concerned – how could he not be, when Oikawa is worked into such a frenzy?

He thinks back to the training camp when he’d found Oikawa suffocating inside the vice of his bandages. He thinks back to when he’d torn them open, when Oikawa refused to tell him where his binder went – back to when Oikawa finally _did_ tell him about it. Those awful nights in college when Oikawa would be cold and shaking, all because of _that man_ that dared call Oikawa his family.

Part of Ushijima hates Oikawa’s father for putting his son through such agony. But part of him understands that the man is old and set in his ways, that beliefs like that aren’t easy to change.

“Sit down, Wakatoshi! Or go for a run or _something_ , you’re driving me up the wall!” Kaede throws a pen at Ushijima’s head as he once more passes the living room, his restlessness making him walk laps around the house. The pen misses and hits the doorframe; Ushijima barely even notices.

It’s sometime around early evening when he hears the gate open and the dogs bound around the side of the house to greet the new visitor; even from the kitchen Ushijima can hear Oikawa’s soft, placating voice as he kneels in the dewy grass to lavish the dogs with pets and kisses. He lingers with them, heading towards the house only when Ushijima opens the door and stands in the shadows of the eaves, just watching.

“You have been crying,” Ushijima observes immediately when Oikawa enters into the soft sphere of light coming from the hall.

“Not even a ‘hello’? That’s heartless, even for you.” Oikawa chuckles as he takes off his shoes, wiping his nose against the back of his hand and sniffling. It’s true, of course – he’d cried the whole way home, holding the watch in his hands. An old lady had asked if he was all right, and when he nodded and said he was merely happy she’d given him a little green tea sweet from the pocket of her blouse.

“Did he hurt you?” Ushijima demands, using a strong arm to bar Oikawa from going any further. His voice is quieter this time, a little more dangerous, and Oikawa cocks an eyebrow, but he can’t help but shiver at the protectiveness of Ushijima’s tone.

“No, he didn’t. In fact, we fixed everything right up. I should have done it earlier.” He ducks under the ace’s arm and trots, humming, to the stairs in order to shower before presenting himself to Kaede and Mitsuru, who are preparing to head to the airport for Mitsuru’s flight back to America.

Ushijima lets out a great sigh of relief; he hates to see Oikawa cry, but he’s learned to appreciate the setter’s happy tears.

When Oikawa is showered and refreshed, Kaede manages to squeeze in an interrogation session before taking Mitsuru to the airport. Oikawa almost starts crying again, but manages to steel himself enough not to – he tells nobody about the watch, which is hidden safely in the pocket of his trousers.

“You’re dressed up,” he observes with raised eyebrows, nodding to Kaede’s suit. She laughs, nodding ruefully.

“After taking Mitsuru to the airport I have to head to Tokyo for a conference,” she explains. Ushijima’s lack of reaction indicates to Oikawa that he’s already aware of this. “I’ll be gone for a few days. Things like this pop up all the time, you see! But I love it. It’s never boring.” She lets out a beautiful laugh, kissing both Oikawa and Ushijima on both cheeks before leading a waving Mitsuru to the car. They watch as they drive off, waving from the gate until the gleam of the headlights vanishes from sight.

Oikawa puts his hands on his hips and lets out a deep, relieved sigh. “God. What a day.”

He thinks of Ushijima’s bed and how much he’d really like to be lying in it; but as the silence of the house presses in around them, reminding him that they’re suddenly and utterly alone, he decides that he has energy for one more thing.

“Hey,” Oikawa purrs, slipping one arm up around Ushijima’s neck and using the other to gently shut the front door, casting them into half-darkness. Ushijima places his hands on the curve of Oikawa’s hips, and fixes him with a knowing glance, one eyebrow shifting inquisitively. “We’ll be alone for the next few days, you know…”

Ushijima makes to kiss him, but before his lips can make contact Oikawa pulls back with a magnificent yawn that brings tears to the corners of his eyes.

“You are tired,” Ushijima murmurs, scooping Oikawa up into his arms and carrying him up the stairs to their bedroom. Oikawa doesn’t really have the energy to complain – after all, even though a few days in complete privacy is a privilege they rarely have anymore, a few hours during the evening won’t make a difference. Oikawa sighs as Ushijima lowers him down into the sheets, easing his own body down beside him to pull him in close.

They spend those few hours talking about their day. Oikawa tells Ushijima everything about his father, and when he takes the watch out of his pocket to show Ushijima tears begin to roll down his cheeks and over his lips, fat and salty and glad. Ushijima gently wipes them away with the pads of his thumbs before strapping the supple leather band around Oikawa’s wrist. The hands still tick, and for a few minutes neither of them speak; they merely listen to the shallow sound of the hands moving across the yellowed face of the watch.

 

The next morning is lazy. Ushijima gets up early to go for his regular run, and this time Oikawa chooses to come with him. He’s only been a few times, but each time has been magical, a green path of forest and rice paddies that seem to stretch on until the very end of the universe. The sky arches cold and fresh above them, still pale from the dawn, the rice farmers yawning and tying their coarse straw hats beneath their chins. Even the air is new, blowing cold and fresh against their skin as they run. They don’t speak and their pace is slow, sweat cooling on their brows, swallows singing and dipping in their wake.

They get home just as the prefecture begins to wake; they take their breakfast slowly, yawning in the gentle sunlight that slopes through the kitchen windows; Oikawa watches as Ushijima takes a small watering can to water the potted plants on the windowsill, his fingers working with precision as he turns over each leaf to inspect the plants’ health.

“You’re so thorough,” Oikawa says – perhaps he’d meant it to be snide, but it comes out as a wistful sigh, and Ushijima only kisses his hair.

 

“It’s nice to be on our own,” Oikawa remarks sometime around mid-morning from where his head lies on Mamoru’s belly; the dog is fast asleep in the sun, his ear flopping over his eyes. Ushijima looks over his shoulder at Oikawa, and upon seeing him lying there in the bright pool of sunlight he can’t help but get up and go over to him. Oikawa has always caught the sun as clear and as dazzling as gold – it turns his hair and his eyes and his skin golden, as though he’d been born right from the sun itself. Ushijima gets to his knees and leans down over his lover, pressing his lips to Oikawa’s warm forehead. The setter sighs, lazily wrapping his arms around Ushijima’s neck to pull him down onto the floor beside him, the ace’s forehead cushioned against Oikawa’s chest. “It’s nice to finally have you all to myself.” With that he rolls them both over so he’s straddling the ace’s hips, his eyes hooded and his smile wry as he runs his hands up and down Ushijima’s shirt. Mamoru – startled awake by Oikawa’s sudden movement – yawns and hauls himself to his feet to pad over to where his water bowl sits outside in the shade of the veranda.

Hesitantly, Ushijima’s hands find their way to Oikawa’s thighs, his big fingers running up over the soft material of Oikawa’s track pants. They’re old and the fabric is thin, so he can feel the heat of Oikawa’s skin and really rather wishes he was wearing something… less.

“You really are shameless,” Ushijima tells him, and Oikawa grins from ear to ear. “Lying in wait like this.”

Over the years, Oikawa has discovered, Ushijima has learned how to be coy. It’s still odd – Ushijima had always struck Oikawa as a bit of a clumsy romantic, but after almost ten years learning the ways of each other’s bodies and minds, Ushijima has become familiar with what to say in order to stroke Oikawa just the right way. His teasing, while still somewhat foreign, is certainly not unappreciated. Oikawa is glad that Ushijima’s inexperienced flushes and concentrated frowns have given way to a smoothed brow and hooded eyes – Ushijima is unbearably attractive when he’s hot under the collar.

“So what if I did?” Oikawa asks, swivelling his hips a little as the fingers tighten on his thighs. “What else did you expect me to do, hm? Sit and twiddle my thumbs like a good little boy until you decided to bend me over?”

Ushijima licks his lips; Oikawa thinks he sees a flash pass over his expression, but figures he probably imagined it. There’s a pressure in his chest, a desperation that he can’t quite find the root of, and he presses his hips down harder. It’s all he can do not to let out a whine. “Tie me up and fuck me.” His words are hard and raw and Ushijima has to swallow the groan that rises in his throat.

Despite Ushijima’s experience, Oikawa still has the ability to knock him clear off his feet with some of the things he says. Ushijima’s eyebrows rise high enough that his brow begins to wrinkle, but his grip on his lover doesn’t loosen, not an inch.

“You want me to tie you up?” he asks, his voice unexpectedly gravelly; Oikawa shivers in pleasure at the sound of it, at the promise that it holds. Running his tongue over his bottom lip, he nods, letting his hips fall into a steady rhythm as they grind back and forth over Ushijima’s groin.

Ushijima sits up, releasing Oikawa’s left thigh in order to curl his hand around the back of the setter’s neck; tangling his fingers tightly in the fine hairs at the nape, he drags Oikawa in to kiss him deeply, his tongue pushing up between the setter’s teeth and lips. He barely has to fight for entry anymore, not when Oikawa melts like this, not when his mouth parts willingly to accept him. He’s never reluctant – in fact, it’s almost like an addiction. Not that Ushijima is any different, though; Oikawa’s soft cherry-like lips are more delicious than anything, and if he could spend his entire life kissing and biting at them, he would.

“All right, then,” Ushijima breathes against Oikawa’s lips when he pulls back, his thumb stroking over the crease of Oikawa’s hip. Oikawa practically purrs, rolling off Ushijima’s lap and onto the floor, leaning back on his elbows to fix Ushijima with an inviting, blistering gaze that’s enough to send a jolt of electricity right to Ushijima’s groin. “Stay there.”

They’ve tried this kind of thing out before. When they were in college they’d gotten increasingly adventurous in their sex life, experimenting here and there with different equipment and dynamics. But due to the inexhaustible eagerness of those days, they’d always lost their patience and ended up fucking on the floor in the mangled mess of their attempts.

The wait feels impossibly long. Oikawa stretches his limber body out over the tatami mats in the sun as he waits, his spine tingling with anticipation.

Ushijima returns not two minutes later with a handful of nondescript hemp rope. They’d bought it years ago at a back street sex shop near their college campus; the hemp is coarser than the cotton variety, more likely to chafe and to burn (which Oikawa had sheepishly admitted he liked), and it’s tough and more durable than ribbon or anything thinner.

“Stop being so impertinent,” Ushijima growls when Oikawa giggles and rolls onto his stomach, refusing to undress on his own. He lets Ushijima pull him from his clothes, pressing hungry kisses to his body here and there until he lies completely naked with skin rising against the breeze. Ushijima sits between his legs, running the rope between his hands, mentally measuring it out length by length. His eyes then wander to Oikawa’s body, grazing over it, imagining where the rope would look the most beautiful. He’s in no hurry, and if Ushijima has learned one thing about his lover, it’s that Oikawa hates waiting. Oikawa parts his legs beneath his gaze, melting open as those bright gold eyes drop lower. Ushijima pulls the rope tight between his fists.

Getting tied up, for Oikawa, is always a truly arousing experience. Not in the same way as when Ushijima shoves his hands beneath his waistband or gropes at him on the train, sure, but it heats him up slowly, the constant pull and scrape of the rope over his skin slowly making him burn. Oikawa likens it to the slow boiling of a lobster, but he’d rather not think of lobsters right now, as fitting as the analogy may be.

Ushijima’s brow is puckered in concentration as he works, his fingers moving precisely and swiftly, knotting and looping, constricting Oikawa’s body bit by bit. He never says a word, never makes a sound, but Oikawa can always sense a change in him – a change that isn’t dissimilar to his own.

And then comes that one decisive tug – the one sharp pull that tightens everything, wrapping and pulling and squeezing all the air from Oikawa’s lungs. Quite suddenly everything stings and Oikawa can’t move – his strong body is suddenly very helpless and entirely vulnerable.

He loves it.

Ushijima sits back on his haunches and looks down at Oikawa who lies bound and squirming in front of him, dressed in a delightful web of rope. He strokes his hand up and down the setter’s calf, noting how he tries his best to close his thighs – he can’t, of course, not when his thighs are tied apart like the wings of a butterfly, his knees bent and his ankles bound as far back against his thighs as possible. His arms are bound behind him, the ropes around his ankles secured to the knot at his wrists by a short doubled-up length of rope, and his fingers are the only things that can move; they clench in and out of fists, and Ushijima gives Oikawa time to wriggle around to smooth out any pinches or snags.

“Are you feeling all right? Ushijima asks, prompting Oikawa to look down the length of his body and nod.

“I’m fine.”

“Good. You know what to say if you want me to stop.” When Oikawa nods, Ushijima picks something up that Oikawa hadn’t seen before – it’s a dental gag. “Open your mouth for me.” Ushijima moves towards the setter’s face, lifting his chin and pushing his thumb between Oikawa’s lips. The setter obediently opens his mouth and lets Ushijima slip the cold metal between his teeth; he bites down, but the gag doesn’t budge. Ushijima makes quick work of it and soon he’s back at Oikawa’s feet again, turning him fully onto his back and stroking his hands appreciatively up and down Oikawa’s thighs. The setter’s back is bent, the smooth plane of his stomach thrust upwards, the muscles bunching and releasing as he breathes. It’s a beautiful sight.

Oikawa tries to tell him to hurry up and _touch_ him already – but all that comes out is a whine, petulant and impatient, his hips shifting slightly up off the floor. He’s so exposed like this, spread open and helpless, reserved only for Ushijima’s entertainment. He can feel the heat shiver through his groin and knows he’s already wet.

“You’ve always been impatient.” Ushijima’s words are followed by a small smile, one that Oikawa doesn’t understand. He can’t do anything when Ushijima gets up and leaves again only to return with a large vibrating wand – when had he got _that_? Oikawa has never seen it before – which he promptly straps to Oikawa’s upper thigh so the head presses flush against Oikawa’s cunt. Oikawa, in turn, lets out a little bark of surprise when he does. The plastic is cold.

The smile, Oikawa realises, is one of amusement. He flushes in humiliation, understanding that his role is, for the moment, one of a toy for Ushijima to play with. Not that he _minds_ , of course, but old habits die hard, and he can’t help but be embarrassed by his sudden lack of power.

The lips of his pussy have already begun to swell, parting as the head of the wand is buried between them. It sits there, stationery and still switched off, but Ushijima’s hand is still on the dial and Oikawa can barely breathe in wake of the anticipation.

“I want to see how much you can take,” Ushijima says, his eyes impossibly dark as he rakes them over the setter’s skin. Oikawa wishes he would kiss him, touch him properly, _something_ to relieve the pressure building inside him. “Is that okay?”

Oikawa nods and tries not to shudder.

And then Ushijima's thumb flicks the switch to the wand’s highest setting, starting it buzzing between Oikawa's legs and making his hips buck up off the ground. Despite the strength of the vibrator, its position doesn't allow Oikawa to get as much pleasure as he'd like. No - Ushijima has plans, that much is for certain. He'd strapped the wand away from Oikawa's clit and over the fleshiest part of his cunt, meaning that Oikawa wouldn't be cumming any time soon, unless Ushijima planned to exert some kind of stimulation elsewhere. Oikawa fixes pleading eyes on Ushijima, who only gives him a small smile in return, his hand resuming that infuriating stroking up and down Oikawa's thigh as the setter tries to keep his hips from jerking about too wildly.

Ushijima watches him for a total of six minutes. Oikawa counts each second, and each second seems to stretch on forever, so those six minutes feel like a lifetime to him. Ushijima watches as he squirms pathetically under the vice of the vibrator, trying to force it to his clit to get the push he needs, to gain that final step towards climax. But he can’t get it to move, no matter how hard he tries, and his tongue begins to swell in his mouth, drool already pooling over his lips and running down his chin. Oikawa knows he probably looks pathetic lying there whining and writhing about, his pussy dripping. He feels utterly humiliated and there’s absolutely nothing he can do about it.

“Ah,” Ushijima says suddenly, glancing at his watch. “I lost track of the time. I’d like to make us dinner before it gets dark.” Oikawa’s eyes widen as he stands up, as casually as if they’re having a _tea party_ , and when Ushijima heads towards the front door he lets out a nervous little moan that’s foreign even to his own ears.

He watches as Ushijima puts on his shoes one by one; he watches as Ushijima puts on his jacket and checks for his wallet and his keys. Is he just going to _leave_ him here? Like _this_?

The door slams and Oikawa is, quite abruptly, very much alone.

The dogs are gone, too. Ushijima must have taken them with him. All the screens are thrown open and Oikawa knows that if anyone should happen to take the narrow path behind Ushijima’s house (a little-known shortcut among the locals), they’d be able to see his pitiful position clear as day. They might even jump the fence and come in and use him for themselves – after all, there’d be nothing Oikawa could do to stop them. The thought makes him sob in painful arousal and his cunt throbs needily between his legs, his hole clenching.

Oikawa would be lying to himself if he said the idea of being caught didn’t thrill him. It does – his bones grow cold but his cunt grows wetter and wetter and needier and needier, the flesh growing swollen and unbearably sensitive. The vibrator has already managed to push him to a near-peak, and it’s holding him a comfortable distance from a climax. The hormones have made his clit fatter and more sensitive than it had ever been, and the flushed little nub peeks out from beneath its hood glistening with fluids and begging for touch, swollen and throbbing and wet as ever.

He tries to roll himself over in order to grind himself against the floor, but the way he’s been tied keeps his hips elevated that little bit too much. His cunt and his mouth are both dripping and every second breath comes out as a moan.

Oikawa doesn’t know how long Ushijima is gone for. The silence threatens to drive him insane – he’s without even the ticking of a clock for company. He can do nothing but watch as the sun creeps across the blue stretch of the sky, and each second is more unbearable than the last. His mind is fading with each second in the wake of his agonising arousal.

 

By the time Ushijima returns, Oikawa’s mind has all but entirely switched off.

He’d run out of radishes and rice for their dinner, and had taken the dogs to the small corner store near the train station. Of course, that store had been closed due to the water pipes being repaired, so he’d had to take the train to the next little hamlet along the line. That’s his story, anyway.

Of course he didn’t do any of that – he’d never left the house in the first place.

He’d _never_ leave Oikawa in such a vulnerable position completely on his own – it’s too dangerous. In reality, Ushijima had merely sat on the front veranda and read with his dogs curled up in the sun at his feet. That way he could keep an ear out for Oikawa in case something went wrong.

It was hard, though – hard not to go in there and fuck him senseless. A tied-up, horny, drooling Oikawa was almost too much for Ushijima to bear, but somehow he had, and he sat a full three hours in the fresh air to try and calm himself down.

And then he entered the house again.

He found Oikawa on his stomach, arms still pulled tight against his spine and the vibrator still wedged firmly against his cunt, which is by now positively flooded with precum. The smell hit him like a tonne of bricks; it’s heady and wet, as though the air itself had grown humid from the sheen of sweat on Oikawa’s body and the fluids dripping from both ends. As soon as Oikawa sees him his eyes light up like a dog seeing its master; Ushijima can tell that Oikawa wants the release only Ushijima can give him. He trusts Ushijima enough to be sure he’ll get it.

This time, though, he’ll have to wait.

Ushijima wants to see how long Oikawa can last. He wants to see the reactions he’ll make under extended duress, how his body will buckle – or maybe how his mind will buckle instead. Either way, Ushijima loves nothing more than having this kind of absolute control over Oikawa Tōru. He always has.

He walks around Oikawa’s body, his steps slow and pensive. My, what a delicious sight he is, dripping and delicious like frosting melting in the sun. Ushijima wants to lick him all over until there’s nothing left of him, but he holds himself back. He has to. He can’t touch him yet.

Finally, there comes a moment when Oikawa realises that Ushijima isn’t going to give him what he wants. The way the hope dies from his eyes is enough to make Ushijima’s dick react, but he ignores it, knowing that if he thinks about it too much he won’t be able to help but fuck Oikawa half to death. The floor glistens with drool and precum and Oikawa presses his face against the mats to try and hide the tears in his eyes.

“Pitiful,” Ushijima murmurs. He sinks to his knees in front of Oikawa’s face, gently lifting it upwards. Oh, those eyes – they’re so beautiful, as bottomless as the ocean, swimming with tears like summer rain. Ushijima tenderly strokes his thumbs against the setter’s soft cheeks before pushing that gorgeous face into his crotch.

Desperately, Oikawa’s tongue lolls out from the metal mouth of the gag to press against the seam of Ushijima’s jeans. He’s not fully hard yet, but there’s a tell-tale bulge that Oikawa decides to lavish all of his attention on. He’s sloppy and messy about it – there’s no time to be gentle, not for Oikawa, not when his head is swimming with unbearable arousal. Not when his cunt is so empty.

The hormones haven’t only made his clit and his cunt fatter, but ever since he’d started taking them his libido had shot through the roof (which he’d never thought possible, since – like most teenagers – he’d been horny to the teeth most of the time). Thankfully, Ushijima has always been there to meet him half-way and fuck him positively senseless. Every single time he’d woken Ushijima in the dead of night with an aching pussy and fiery skin, he’d rolled him over onto his hands and his knees and pushed his cock so deep inside him Oikawa saw stars. The memory alone begins to compound at the back of Oikawa’s hazy mind, and it certainly doesn’t make things any easier.

He tries to call out; his voice leaves him in a high, pathetic moan. He’s so aroused he can barely see through his swimming vision, but he’s still able to feel the hands cupping his face, thumbs stroking his skin so _infuriatingly_ casually. It’s only a few centimetres between them, but to Oikawa it might as well be miles.

How pathetic. He can’t even _beg_ – all he can do is moan and drool and try to use his eyes to convey what he wants. But even that’s hard to do when they’re swimming with tears.

Ushijima can barely breathe; Oikawa is rapidly falling apart before him, humping himself up and down on the vibrator and lapping his tongue over his fingers, dripping and sopping and drooling. His heart pounds at the base of his throat and for a moment he wonders if – possibly – he’ll break before Oikawa does.

He gently strokes the hair back from Oikawa’s face, caressing him with touches that are nothing less than loving. Oikawa looks so frustrated that Ushijima almost chuckles – he might have too, if his cock hadn’t been so hard.

Ushijima’s hands drop to his jeans, popping open the fly and pushing down his boxers enough to free his cock. Oikawa’s eyes water at the sight of it and his tongue reaches out, his entire body dragging painfully across the floor.

“Easy, now,” Ushijima rumbles, one hand going back to stroking Oikawa’s hair. The setter’s eyes are fixed hungrily on Ushijima’s cock, his tongue falling past his lower lip. Ushijima is careful to keep the head of his dick just out of reach – not much, but just enough to drive Oikawa insane.

It’s only when Oikawa’s body heaves with a sob that Ushijima allows him to put his mouth on his cock. His lips are dripping and oh so sweet. Ushijima can’t resist running his hands through Oikawa’s hair and tugging just a little bit. The gag props his mouth open and keeps his teeth away, so Ushijima is able to slowly slide himself over Oikawa’s tongue and deep into the hot, tight recess of his mouth. He groans loudly when the head of his cock pushes against the spongy flesh of Oikawa’s throat, and the setter gags a little, flinching as tears pool in his eyes. It only makes him more gorgeous and far more enjoyable for Ushijima to sink his cock into.

Ushijima yanks Oikawa’s hair a little harder. “Open it. I know you can do it, Tōru.”

The setter sighs at the sound of his name, his eyes closing and his throat pulsing as he struggles to swallow Ushijima’s thick cock. His throat begins to sting and his jaw aches terribly, but he tries his hardest because – at least in his mind – if he pleases Ushijima then hopefully Ushijima will please him in return. But as Oikawa deepthroats the man before him, all Ushijima does is stroke his hair, giving a sharp little tug every now and again.

“You really are beautiful, Tōru,” Ushijima murmurs, his voice escaping him a little out of breath. He uses his grip on Oikawa’s hair to begin thrusting, moving Oikawa’s mouth rather than his own hips. The wet gagging sounds that fill the room are positively obscene; Ushijima swears he’s never been harder in his life. He can see Oikawa’s hips stuttering as he tries to find something – _anything_ – to grind against, but of course there’s nothing, and his lip curls in disdain, his eyes somehow managing to direct a glare up at Ushijima.

That glare is enough.

Ushijima yanks Oikawa off his cock and practically throws him across the floor. Annoyed, he pinches the setter’s face in one hand while the other removes the gag; strings of viscous saliva run from the metal to Oikawa’s flushed lips, and Oikawa sniffles and coughs and winces as he’s finally able to move his jaw again. His entire body is shuddering, his thighs slick with precum, but somehow he’s regained the ability to bare his teeth and sneer.

Ushijima slaps him hard across the cheek. Oikawa’s head snaps back, his vision reeling as pain blossoms across his face. His hips rise, cunt throbbing at the impact, and he lets out a hoarse moan before he can stop himself. He’s too overwhelmed – Ushijima’s hands seem to be all over him, everywhere at once; his body is too sensitive, his mind is too heavy, he _can’t –_

“…’katoshi,” Oikawa begins, his voice slurred with thick saliva. His breath shudders in a sob, his body burning and sensitive. “Wakatoshi _please_ –,”

Ushijima stares down at him tight-lipped with hungry eyes, his cock caught in a slick fist. He strokes it slowly, drawing back the foreskin and running the pad of his thumb over the head, the flesh already dripping from Oikawa’s sloppy blowjob. He doesn’t look happy at Oikawa’s – albeit brief – show of attitude. He’ll make Oikawa realise his mistake.

“You don’t like not being in control,” Ushijima says as he rakes his nails up the inside of Oikawa’s thigh. He takes hold of the vibrating wand and presses it even harder against the setter’s pussy, eliciting a hoarse cry from his throat. “You especially don’t like being controlled by me. Not like this. It still doesn’t feel _right_ , because you can’t let go of the past. Can you?” He works open the knots that bind the wand to Oikawa’s thigh so he can take hold of it properly.

When the wand leaves his cunt, Oikawa’s body sags a little and his pained moans grow softer. He’s still quivering, his cunt raw and flushed and impossibly wet, his clit swollen and begging for attention, but the release of direct pressure is a little bit of relief.

“I’ll let you control something.” Ushijima holds the wand inches away from Oikawa’s clit. “If you want it, Tōru, then you can get it yourself.”

If Oikawa could have kicked him, he would’ve.

He’s so sensitive that he can practically feel the air vibrating. He pushes his hips up, but just as he thinks he’s about to touch the wand, Ushijima raises it a little higher so it sits just out of reach. He does this each time Oikawa raises his hips from the floor, and the setter can only imagine how pathetic he must look all tied up and arching his hips into the air to try and glean a touch from the head of the wand. Ushijima _wants_ to embarrass him. He wants to make him feel pathetic. He wants him to feel powerless and humiliated and in pain.

Because he knows that Oikawa likes it. It’s a desire he has that he can’t confess to anyone, even to Ushijima. But Ushijima just _knows_ – he always does. Oikawa feigns a bitter attitude whenever he wants to be tortured like this, especially in the middle of such a scene. He’s something that Ushijima has to keep poking and prodding and knocking about until something snaps.

“My, it looks rather painful for you.” Ushijima’s eyes shine from where they gaze – unblinking – at Oikawa. His dark hair hangs into his face, over his eyes, and each time Oikawa’s own gaze meets that freezing gold, a shudder runs from his scalp to his toes. “You can keep trying or you can ask nicely.” _You can surrender everything you have to me, and I’ll give you what you want._

For a moment Oikawa doesn’t reply. He grits his teeth and turns his face away to try and hide his tears, but Ushijima sees them, and takes Oikawa’s face into his hands to swab them away with his tongue.

“Please,” Oikawa whispers, his voice hoarse and broken and shaking. “Please help me.”

“Hm? Help you how?”

A flush begins to rise up Oikawa’s neck. “F-fuck me, please –,”

“Be specific, Tōru. What do you want? If you don’t tell me, I can’t help you.” Ushijima’s smile is sharp against the skin of Oikawa’s throat.

“I want you to fuck my cunt,” Oikawa gasps. He can barely hold back his sob of need; his voice begins to rise in volume and in pitch, arching throughout the room in desperation. “Please fuck my pussy with your dick –,”

With a groan that comes from deep in his chest, Ushijima shoves Oikawa onto his front again and yanks his hips up so he can spread that beautiful, dripping cunt with his fingers. Oikawa’s hole clenches desperately around the air, begging to be filled and stretched. If Ushijima had more patience he might have eaten Oikawa out until he was crying, but for the moment his cock is so hard it feels like it might just burst; his hands shake as he pushes the thick head of his cock against Oikawa’s entrance and slowly sinks his weight forwards.

His cock parts the thick, swollen flesh as easily as a warm knife through butter. If it hadn’t been for Ushijima’s sure grip on the ropes around Oikawa’s shoulders, the setter would have melted into a puddle on the floor. Ushijima’s eyes are riveted on the way Oikawa’s cunt swallows his cock up, raw and unprotected.

“Put your hands around my neck,” Oikawa slurs. He’s completely clocked out, now, his eyes hooded and unfocussed. Ushijima has to pause and take a deep breath in just to stop himself from cumming right there – he reaches forwards, closing his huge hands around Oikawa’s neck and _squeezes_ until Oikawa lets out a little choking noise that shoots straight to Ushijima’s cock.

He uses his leverage on Oikawa’s neck to begin thrusting; he pulls out his cock, dripping from the mix of their flowing juices, until just the head is sat inside before sliding back in again. He starts out slow not so much for Oikawa’s sake, but for his own; after all, seeing your lover tied up and humping their hips back on your cock is pretty difficult not to cum to.

Soon enough the pace he sets is bruising; he forces Oikawa’s head against the floor and pounds against his hips, their wet skin smacking together and Oikawa letting out delicious, high whines each time Ushijima’s cock bruises against the mouth of his womb. It’s raw and it’s primal and it’s obscene – Oikawa’s skin is red beneath the ropes, the weave having chafed it to rawness, and his face is flushed from where Ushijima’s hand presses against his windpipe. He feels like he’s about to explode into a million tiny pieces.

And then Ushijima flips him over onto his back again, taking the vibrating wand in a shaking hand and switching it once more to its highest setting. Oikawa barely notices – he’s too focussed on the painful stretch of his cunt as it’s effectively destroyed by his lover’s cock. But when Ushijima shoves the head of the wand against Oikawa’s aching, engorged clit, he’s brought back to reality very, very hard.

Oikawa shrieks at the contact and his hips buck upwards, his head thrown back against the floor and his stomach heaving. His clit hasn’t been touched _once_ this whole time, and now Ushijima is holding the head of the wand hard against it, and Oikawa thinks he’s finally going mad. A sob tears out of him and somehow it turns into a half-scream. Ushijima has to hold his body down so it doesn’t thrash too wildly.

He can’t bring himself to make any discernible sounds; all Oikawa can do is thrash and scream. Ushijima watches it all with pupils so wide with lust that his eyes are nearly black, his powerful hips pounding harder and faster between Oikawa’s legs. He leans down, catching the setter’s ear between his teeth and biting down hard enough to draw blood.

The cry Oikawa lets out when he finally – _finally_ – cums is enough to curdle Ushijima’s blood in his veins, his body curling in and his back arching off the floor. Oikawa can’t breathe – it’s as though he’s suffocating, the pleasure crushing him until he’s crying and sobbing and humping himself between Ushijima’s cock and the wand. He’s _dying_ – he’s sure he is. His pussy shivers and clenches down hard on Ushijima’s cock, and at the very crest of his orgasm he squirts a thin, almond-sweet liquid all over his thighs and Ushijima’s groin. He’s lost control of his body, and even after he’s come down from his high Ushijima keeps fucking him, holding the vibrator tight against his clit.

It takes Ushijima perhaps half a minute longer to finish. That thirty seconds is the most agonising thirty seconds Oikawa has ever had to endure in his life – partly because his body is so oversensitive that any touch against his clit is enough to be painful, and partly because his body thirsts for Ushijima’ cum inside him. His womb aches for it, and despite the shivering and the pain coursing through him, Oikawa pushes his body down on Ushijima’s cock to try and get it as deep inside him as he can.

Ushijima presses his face into Oikawa’s neck as he cums, his last few thrusts hard and deep; if he were to look down he could see the bulge of his cock against Oikawa’s abdomen, but instead he raises his face to meet Oikawa in a sloppy kiss. His whole body throbs as he releases his cum inside Oikawa, his hips automatically moving to push it in as deep as he can, like some animalistic instinct. And then they collapse, all at once, utterly and completely exhausted.

Oikawa lies there in half-consciousness as Ushijima carefully unknots him from his bindings. His limbs scream as they’re released and straightened out, his skin burning from the harsh weave of the ropes. But Oikawa can’t bring himself to scream at the pain – all he can do is sob, very softly, until the feeling returns to his hands like a million little pins pushed right into his nerves.

Ushijima strokes his hair. Despite the fact that his body feels ready to give out at any moment, his main and _only_ concern is whether or not Oikawa is okay. Everything he’d put him through in the last few hours was wont to be draining, both mentally and physically; Oikawa curls into him and sobs into his shoulder, his sweaty hands clinging to Ushijima as tightly as they can.

They lay there, just breathing, Ushijims stroking up and down Oikawa’s back and kissing his hair and his face until slowly the setter’s sobs quietens, until his body stops shaking and instead spreads out as malleable as putty across the floor. Only then do they speak, their voices still out of breath and their faces still dripping with sweat.

“Are you all right?”

Oikawa looks up at him with his face covered in tears, sweat, and snot. It’s ugly, but Ushijima finds himself falling in love all over again. Oikawa nods and then manages a little smile, stroking his fingers over Ushijima’s cheek.

“I love you,” Oikawa says, and for a moment it sounds like he might start crying again. He kisses Ushijima gently, holding him close, and he only pulls back far enough so he can lay their foreheads together. “I love you more than anything, Wakatoshi.”

Perhaps it’s the exhaustion and the sudden drop of adrenaline that makes tears well at the corner of Ushijima’s eyes. Or maybe it’s the fact that Oikawa – the love of his life right from his middle school days – trusts him enough to let Ushijima tie him up and close his hands around his throat. Either way, something in his chest feels ready to burst, and Ushijima can’t help but lay kisses on Oikawa’s cheeks.

They lie there for a little longer, until the sun turns cool in the early reaches of the afternoon; they lie there until they regain enough energy to get to their feet, and then they fill a tubful of warm water to soak their aching muscles. Ushijima gently rubs the raw skin of Oikawa’s body where the ropes had been, cleaning him up carefully and letting the lingering remnants of their arousal ebb away until they’re left with only warmth.

“That was amazing,” Oikawa sighs as he leans back against Ushijima’s chest. “My body hurts _so_ much. It’ll probably hurt even more tomorrow.” There’s no bitterness in his voice – only contentment. He settles back with his eyes closed and a smug smile gracing his features. “There are so many people who’d be jealous of me right now.”

They order take-away from a little place near the train station and lie in bed eating and talking until the late hours of the night. Every hour Ushijima asks Oikawa how he’s feeling, and every time Oikawa looks at him and smiles a smile that’s so full of love that Ushijima’s mouth goes dry.


	6. Imagination

When Oikawa wakes the next morning his body might as well be screaming.

While the sensations of pins being stuck into his nerves has faded during the night, his muscles still ache from where they’d been stretched taut the day before. He feels curiously like he does the morning after an intense training session; it’s the same kind of pain, the kind that’s irritating but somehow very satisfying at the same time.

The first thing he notices when he wakes up is that Ushijima is not beside him. He glances at the clock and finds that it’s almost ten o’clock, so if Ushijima had gone on his morning run (which Oikawa doubts, considering how exhausted the ace had been the night before) he ought to be back by now. With a groan, Oikawa lifts himself onto his elbows, rubbing at his eyes with the back of his hand.

It takes him a solid five minutes to get out of bed, which is a record, even for him. He’s still naked, so he goes to Ushijima’s dresser and pulls out the first shirt he can find – it’s a horribly garish yellow colour with the name of some sports brand printed across the front, but it’s big and soft and smells like Ushijima, so Oikawa pulls it on without complaint and then yanks on some of his own boxers. As he stretches the muscles in his back he hears the rush of water from the back yard; curious, he goes to the westernmost window of Ushijima’s room – the one that looks out over the yard – and leans out of it. The midmorning breeze is cool against his face and he takes a moment to savour it.

He looks down to see Ushijima standing on the wide stretch of grass beyond the little gardens of raked sand and rocks, a hosepipe in one hand and a large mat in the other. Yoshio, the Ushijimas’ spritely little shiba inu, bounds in circles around him and throws himself onto his back whenever Ushijima sprays the hose in his direction.

Ushijima hauls the mat over the back fence next to three others of its kind; once it’s hung there he directs the jet of water against it, using a short-bristled brush to scrub at the straws, which remain surprisingly sturdy. He’s barefoot and bare-chested, wearing shorts that come to his knees; just long enough for Yoshio to cram his nose beneath to express his unhappiness that his master’s attention isn’t fully on him.

Oikawa puts his fingers to his lips and wolf-whistles from the window. “Good morning, handsome!” he calls. “What are you doing?”

Ushijima turns expectantly towards the sound, and as soon as the hosepipe turns towards the grass again Yoshio throws himself beneath it and rolls around in the puddle it makes. “Oh, you’re awake. I needed to clean the tatami mats from yesterday, since you insisted on spraying yourself all over them.”

Oikawa flushes so violently that it feels like his ears are on fire. How can Ushijima say it so _casually_?! Ashamed, Oikawa sinks from sight, sitting on the floor beneath the window and covering his blushing face with his hands. When he manages to regain enough of his dignity he rises and makes his way downstairs to meet Ushijima in the yard; on the way he considers _maybe_ hitting him for saying something so outrageous.

“What if the neighbours heard?” Oikawa hisses as he strides out into the sunlight, his aching body momentarily forgotten, and when he reaches Ushijima he smacks him on the shoulder. Ushijima only laughs and turns the jet of water onto him, hitting him right beneath the jaw.

If Oikawa hadn’t been so sore he would’ve tackled him. However, as things are, he knows that tackling Ushijima would not only fail, but would cause him a whole lot of undue pain. So he whips off his shirt and smacks Ushijima with that instead before huffing and retreating back to the safety of the house.

“Will it stain?” he asks when Ushijima finally comes inside after having turned off the hose and left the mats in the sun to dry. The room looks odd with some of the mats missing, a crater of bare wooden floorboards amidst the faded green. Oikawa has changed into another one of Ushijima’s shirts (a nicer one, this time) and sits on his knees by the hole, gnawing nervously at his lip.

“It won’t,” Ushijima assures him, “they get dirty all the time. When I was a child – when we first got the dogs – they would always have accidents on the mats before we managed to train them. They’re very easy to clean.”

Oikawa sighs in relief; the last thing he wants is for Ushijima’s mother to question them about stains on her floor. Because, knowing Ushijima, he’d tell her _exactly_ how they came about, and Oikawa really isn’t sure if he could live through something like that.

“How are you feeling?” Ushijima asks as Oikawa gets to his feet, going over to wrap his arms lazily around the ace’s neck and lie his cheek against Ushijima’s sun-warmed skin. Ushijima spies the still-red marks on Oikawa’s wrists and gently takes his hand, turning it over to kiss the inside of Oikawa’s wrist.

“Hungry.” Oikawa makes a show of batting his eyelashes up at Ushijima, hoping he will take the hint. Thankfully, he does and Oikawa is able to lie in the sun while the delicious smells of their soon-to-be breakfast waft out from the kitchen. While he waits he pulls out his phone, tossing it into the air and catching it again. He does this for a little while – until he misses a catch, causing his phone to land on his face, whereupon he decides that it’s probably a good time to stop. So, instead, he opens up his contacts, humming.

“Iwa-chan, good morning!” he sings into the receiver, rolling onto his stomach. “I hope you didn’t miss me too much.”

“I entirely forgot about your existence and it was the best time of my life.” Iwaizumi’s voice is short and bristly when he replies, but isn’t without good humour, and Oikawa feigns a sob.

“I want you to come over.”

Iwaizumi snorts and Oikawa hears the faint rustle of sheets; he must still be in bed, something that wouldn’t be at all surprising. “I appreciate your concern for my availability.”

“Well, Iwa-chan, I know that since you love me _so_ much that you’d put aside absolutely everything to come and see me, right? But, oh –,” Oikawa glances towards the doorway to see Ushijima standing there wiping his hands on a dishcloth, eyebrows raised only a fraction in curiosity. “Don’t show too much concern or else Ushiwaka-chan might get jealous.” He smiles and bats his eyelashes as prettily as he can.

“Good – maybe then he’ll beat your ass like you deserve.”

Oikawa _really_ doesn’t mean for his voice to drop. “Don’t worry. He already did that last night.”

Iwaizumi makes a retching noise from the other end of the line and Oikawa can practically see the way his lip curls in disgust. “That’s vile. I didn’t need to know that!” There’s a pause between them as Oikawa chuckles. “Now listen here, asshole. If you wanna see me then come to Sendai and I’ll buy you a coffee, yeah?”

“Iwa-chan is always so thoughtful. But okay. It’s a deal. How about tomorrow?”

“Whatever, works for me.”

 

It’s been far too long since Oikawa had properly sat down with his best friend. They’d seen each other constantly since Oikawa’s return to Japan, but the last time they’d really had a proper sit-down conversation had been weeks ago. Oikawa would rather see him today, but if the raw marks on his wrists are anything to go by, his body would need a little more time to heal before then. Unless he’s willing to wear a turtleneck (which he isn’t).

Ushijima leans around the doorway to call Oikawa to his food; Oikawa leaps to his feet with energy surprising for someone who’s still recovering from getting their brains fucked out the day before. But, he reasons, there’s nothing a little good food won’t fix.

 

* * *

 

 

He’s excited. He’s excited to see Iwaizumi again after weeks of on-and-off phone conversations and cancelled plans; now that they have their own lives it’s difficult to try and meet up as often as they did in their youth.

As soon as Oikawa sees him he launches himself into Iwaizumi’s arms, hands flung around his neck and a delighted cry on his lips. Iwaizumi only laughs gruffly, but he hugs back, glad to see his friend again. They head over to a small café they used to frequent in high school, and it’s a place full of old memories for the both of them. They choose a seat outside under a faded blue-and-white umbrella.

Iwaizumi, Oikawa notices, looks older. He’s gotten more solid, though some of his muscle had softened ever since he’d given up volleyball in lieu of medical studies. He’s still young, certainly, but his face seems deeper, more mature than it had been before. His hair is shorter, too, cropped close to his scalp to keep it at minimal mess.

“God,” Iwaizumi sighs after a waiter takes their orders. “Look at us. I feel like an old man already.”

Oikawa hums and leans his chin on his hand. “A doctor and an Olympian, who would’ve thought, hm? Do you think our mothers are proud?”

Iwaizumi grins at him from across the table. “I know they are. Your mom hasn’t shut up about you ever since you won, did you know that?”

“I’m not surprised.”

Oikawa seems happy enough – but Iwaizumi knows him too well to let the slight stiffness slide from beneath his nose. It’s almost imperceptible, but there’s something Oikawa isn’t telling him, and he decides there and then to weevil it out whatever it takes.

“What aren’t you telling me?”

Oikawa blinks his big brown eyes at him, his smile innocent and absolutely vapid. “What? I’m not _not_ telling you anything.”

Iwaizumi only quirks an eyebrow.

“ _Fine_ ,” Oikawa relents eventually. He rubs his hands over his face with a groan before taking a breath. “Iwa-chan, I met you here for a reason. I need to give you some news and I’d prefer to be the first one to tell you.”

Immediately, Iwaizumi looks concerned. His brows draw together and furrow deeply, his entire face growing stormy. “What’s wrong? You’re not sick, are you? Did something happen to your knee?”

“No, no, I’m not hurt!” Oikawa hurriedly assures him. “It’s not like that at all. I just… wanted to tell you that Ushiwaka-chan and I are trying for a baby.”

Iwaizumi stares at him, his mouth hanging open a little bit.

At first Oikawa thinks Iwaizumi might yell at him; his face begins to pale, then turn a curious shade of pink. And then Iwaizumi bursts out laughing.

It’s so uproarious that the people sitting at nearby tables turn to glance at them; Iwaizumi has to double over at one point, wiping away the tears in his eyes with the back of his hands.

“What’s so funny?!” demands Oikawa, partly annoyed but mostly confused.

“You… you and Ushiwaka want to have a kid!” Iwaizumi manages to splutter once he’s got his laughter under control again. “I’m sorry, it’s just… it’s just so surreal. I remember when the mere mention of his name would have you seeing red. And now you’re starting a family with him. _Shit,_ that makes me feel old.” He rubs both of his hands through his hair, ruffling it at angles reminiscent of their high school years.

Oikawa pouts and kicks Iwaizumi beneath the table. “You’re so rude. At least be happy for me!”

The grin Iwaizumi gives Oikawa is more brilliant than the sun. Unable to contain himself to his seat, he vaults himself out of it to yank the setter into his arms, hugging him tighter than ever. Oikawa smacks him and complains that he can’t breathe; but he hugs back all the same, because he’s _happy_. Everything is beginning to fall into place.

“I should’ve told you sooner,” Oikawa apologises with a little smile after they both sit down again. The waiter returns with their drinks shortly after, and Oikawa sees that Iwaizumi still hasn’t kicked his habit of drinking hot drinks in hot weather. “But a lot’s been going on.”

“Tell me about it. I have news for you, too.”

Oikawa squints at him. “Don’t tell me you’re trying to get pregnant too, Iwa-chan – I know biology was never your strongest class, but –,” Iwaizumi clips him upside the head before he can finish, causing him to bust out into laughter.

“Of course not, you idiot! No. I asked Hana to marry me.”

Now it’s Oikawa’s turn to look shocked. “You didn’t even tell me beforehand!” he cries. “Poor Hana-chan must have suffered the most unromantic proposal in the world. Did she reject you, Iwa-chan?”

Iwaizumi grimaces. “I can take care of myself! And no, she didn’t. She said yes.”

Oikawa coos. “That’s sweet. I mean that, by the way.” Iwaizumi’s girlfriend had been his sweetheart since college – in Oikawa’s opinion, Iwaizumi had waited far too long to pop the question. She’s a lovely young woman, short and sunny like a drop of summer rain. Oikawa loves her – and, evidently, Iwaizumi does too. “Maybe we’ll have babies at the same time.”

This time it’s Iwaizumi who kicks him. “We’re not even married yet, asshole, slow down. Some of us like to move slowly.”

“Iwa-chan, no offence but if you moved any slower we’d all be dead.”

Iwaizumi just grins.

“Tōru,” Iwaizumi says, his voice low, and suddenly Oikawa feels a heavy weight descending down over his shoulders; whatever Iwaizumi wants to say must be serious if he’s using his given name. The decisive scrunching of his features say the same thing. “I… ah. I want you to be my best man.”

Oikawa doesn’t mean for the tears to spring to his eyes. They just _do_. He refrains from wiping at his eyes in case he draws attention to them, though he figures Iwaizumi wouldn’t tease him about it, not this time. “I want that. I want to be your best man, Iwa-chan, even if it’s just to make sure you don’t trip and fall on your ass!” He laughs in an attempt to cover up the way his voice shakes, but it fails miserably, and Iwaizumi only grins wider.

“Yeah… I definitely think our moms would be proud of us.”

After a few moments, though, something in Iwaizumi’s expression falters. His happiness splits, like a fissure opening right in the middle of his face, and Oikawa knows that he’s realised something.

“It’s sad that you and Ushijima can’t… you know. Get married and all of that.” Iwaizumi rubs at the back of his neck as though it’s somehow his fault, or as though he feels guilty because of it. Something painful squeezes inside Oikawa’s chest, but he reaches across the glass tabletop and gives Iwaizumi’s hand a sympathetic squeeze.

“It’s all right,” he assures him. “For other people like Ushiwaka and I, it’s an issue that should be addressed, sure, but for us it isn’t so much a problem. We… he and I don’t need to get married. Neither of us really have a god whose eyes we want to be united in, y’know? There’s no sense in a ceremony like that, not for us.”

Iwaizumi looks at him doubtfully, but there’s a glint of mischief in his eye. “I think that’s the first time you’ve ever turned down an opportunity to be the centre of attention.”

Oikawa sniffs and turns up his nose, pointedly choosing to ignore it. “If we wanted to get married we’d go to America or something like that, probably. Even though it wouldn’t be recognised here.”

“I’d be _your_ best man, wouldn’t I?”

Oikawa laughs. “Of course you would be, you meathead.”

 

* * *

 

 

Even after they say their farewells and Oikawa boards the train home again, he’s buzzing. Each cell of his body feels like it’s been set alight with the thought of his best friend’s impending marriage – as a teenager he’d always been worried about Iwaizumi ending up with someone completely wrong for him, but now his fears have been laid to rest. His girlfriend (fiancée, now, he supposes) couldn’t be more right. She’s the only person aside from Iwaizumi’s mother who has the nerve to hit Iwaizumi Hajime. Which, as far as Oikawa is concerned, is definitely a step in the right direction.

He’d never really thought about marriage before… not in elementary school when the little girls had gone through a phase of drawing wedding dresses in the backs of their notebooks, nor in high school. Or college. Or ever, actually. But now that all his friends are beginning to get married, it’s hard for him _not_ to think about. He spreads his left hand out over his thigh and his heart stutters in his chest when he imagines a thin gold band stretched taut over his finger.

He thinks about it the whole way from the station back to the Ushijimas’ house.

“Oh, it’s you.” Oikawa turns to glance over his shoulder, his hand still raised to knock for someone to let him in, only to see Ushijima swinging the gate shut with his foot. His hands are laden with white shopping bags. “Didn’t you bring a key with you?”

“I forgot,” Oikawa replies as Ushijima approaches him and shifts the bags up over his wrists in order to wriggle the key into the lock. “Hey, do you ever think about getting married?”

The jiggling of the lock stops and golden eyes turn to fix on him. Ushijima continues to stare at him for far longer than Oikawa is really comfortable with, and he slowly begins to feel himself blush. “N-not that I’m asking you. I was just wondering – ah, forget it! Forget I ever said anything.” He reached out to unlock the door, shouldering his way inside to try and hide his flaming cheeks.

“Oikawa, wait.” There’s the sound of rustling plastic and a shutting door from behind him; Oikawa doesn’t want to stop, but he does. He turns reluctantly to face him. “Where’s this coming from? You… you’ve never talked about marriage before. Apart from that time when you were drunk you told me that you thought it was an overrated parade anyway.”

Oikawa hadn’t thought it was possible to blush even deeper. Apparently he’d been wrong. “Yeah, well… Iwa-chan’s getting married soon, did you know? So of course I’ve been thinking about it.” He tries to keep his voice light and somewhat snide – it’s difficult. “Can we drop it?”

Ushijima pauses, but eventually nods, and goes back to taking the shopping back into the kitchen.

They don’t talk about it for the rest of the afternoon. In fact, there’s a certain tension between them that hadn’t been there before, the longing to discuss but the lack of courage to do so. Oikawa hates it.

It’s only in the evening when he finally decides to try and shake off the last remnants of that tension; he hears Ushijima running a bath, and when the water eventually shuts off he waltzes into the bathroom to find Ushijima rinsing out his hair.

“Is something wrong?” Ushijima asks, and Oikawa shakes his head, slipping his shirt up over his head.

“No,” he says, and once fully naked he steps into the tub, sinking down so he’s sitting at the opposite end of the tub, the water rising to balance at the lip of it. “Nothing’s wrong.” He raises a wet foot and gently pushes it against Ushijima’s cheek until the ace reaches up and closes his hand around Oikawa’s ankle.

“You’re lying.” Ushijima pulls on Oikawa’s ankle until he can reach his other hand out and curl it around Oikawa’s waist, tugging him into his lap. “Don’t lie to me.”

Oikawa avoids eye contact for as long as he can, but eventually he looks down at Ushijima, pushing the wet hair out of his eyes. “Sorry for getting so freaked out before. I’d marry you if you wanted me to.”

“I don’t want you to.”

Oikawa’s heart turns to a fist-size chunk of ice in his chest. He smiles thinly. “That’s a little heartless.”

“I love you,” Ushijima tells him sternly, keeping his grip on Oikawa firm so he can’t storm out of the bathroom. “I don’t need a frilly ceremony to tell me that. Marriage – it means a ceremony, yes, but it’s origin lies in the union of two things. We’re already married, Tōru.”

Oikawa’s skin jitters. He sees the sense in it – Ushijima is right. “United, huh?” he mumbles, dipping his lips to press against the ridge of Ushijima’s cheek. “To marry is to be united. So we’ve been married since our last year of high school.” Ushijima’s skin is warm and soft beneath his lips and he chases a rivulet of water down the strong column of the ace’s neck.

“I meant united in spirit, but being united physically is much the same, certainly.” A deep chuckle rumbles through Ushijima’s chest, and beneath the water one of his hands slides to press against Oikawa’s pubic mound. The setter shivers, skin rising, and he presses himself up against his lover.

“Marry me now, then,” he breathes against the whorl of Ushijima’s ear, lifting his hips to rub himself down against Ushijima’s thigh.

Ushijima exhales, a moan rolling off his tongue, and turns his face to press his lips against Oikawa’s pale throat. “Every day until I die,” he promises, pulling Oikawa tightly into his lap and clumsily reaching into the space between them, feeling as Oikawa’s body shudders against his fingers and his cock. “Every day I’ll marry you.”

As their hips rock together the bathwater begins to splash over the sides of the tub, flooding the floor in pools that glisten and reflect the steam hanging near the ceiling. Oikawa’s head is dizzy and he tips it back, closing his eyes and letting himself drown in the muted sensations, the muted pleasure, the muted love. The heaviness of Ushijima’s hand over his abdomen is like fire and the impossible pressure of his cock inside him fills him to bursting.

They don’t use towels to dry off; by the time they drain the bath and raise their lips from each other’s skin, the steam has evaporated and the water has dried. From the bathroom they wander to the bedroom and slip into Ushijima’s soft, warm bed. Oikawa closes his eyes and lets himself melt into the sheets, but is startled to wakefulness when Ushijima shuffles down the bed. For a second Oikawa thinks he’s going to eat him out, but the look in Ushijima’s eyes isn’t right for that – it’s not one he’s seen before.

“What are you doing?” he asks quietly, watching as the golden lamplight glances off of Ushijima’s hair and the ridges of his muscular back. Ushijima doesn’t reply; he only lays his head against Oikawa’s abdomen, pressing his cheek and his ear to the skin and closing his eyes. Oikawa doesn’t dare move – he’s still confused. What’s he doing? Why is he –

And then he realises. Ushijima has placed his ear right over Oikawa’s womb.

“Is there something in there?” he whispers, stroking his own fingers through Ushijima’s hair. “Can you feel it?”

Ushijima’s eyes open sleepily, and he smiles.


	7. Intonation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HEY GUYS LONG TIME NO SEE the reason this chap is later than usual is because both me and my beta have been incredibly busy (tfw finals and 2 new ragdoll kittens........this shit keeps u busy), sooooooooo to get this chapt written and proofed has taken QUITE A WHILE. but it is here. finally.

Oikawa throws down the little stick of plastic onto the kitchen table. “It’s negative.”

Ushijima folds up his newspaper and takes off his glasses, reaching out to pick up the stick and look at it. Oikawa stands across the table with his hands on his hips and his face screwed up in dismay. He’d hoped this test would be the one he wouldn’t have to add to his ever-growing pile of failed ones.

“I don’t _get_ it.” Oikawa, finally, drops into a seat and lets his head fall down onto his arms. “Why isn’t it working? We fuck a lot and you cum like a horse. Any more and I’d drown.”

Ushijima is still looking at the pregnancy test, turning it over in his hands; he’s frowning, now, one hand rubbing at his chin. “I don’t know. I can’t answer that.”

Oikawa turns his head to the side and gazes forlornly out the window. Somehow he feels like he’s sinking, exhaustion hitting him suddenly like a truckload of bricks.

They’d been trying for a baby for weeks, now, and yet nothing had come of it.

“Maybe you’re infertile,” Oikawa mumbles without looking away from the table; out of the corner of her eye he sees Ushijima look up at him sharply, and he vaguely wonders if Ushijima’s feelings have been hurt. He sighs.

Ushijima sets down the test. “Do you think we should go and get tested properly?” he asks. “In a clinic, I mean.”

Oikawa looks at him nervously and catches his lower lip between his teeth, chewing on it. “My gynaecologist is in the States right now. I don’t know if anyone will be friendly to someone like me.” It’s not like Oikawa can just walk anonymously into a gynaecologist’s office – he’s an elite Olympic athlete. His name had been plastered all over every newspaper in Japan not six months ago, and with such a high-profile victory he doubts there are many people who don’t know his name. Nobody knows his secret, and he plans to take it to the grave, because if the media ever got wind of it then his career might as well be over.

This time it’s Ushijima’s turn to sigh. He rubs his eyes tiredly; the longer the tests stay negative the more frustrating it becomes. Everything has been going so well – this is proving to be a wall they can’t seem to push past, a frustration they can’t seem to rid themselves of. Oikawa reaches out and takes Ushijima’s hand, rubbing his thumb over the palm. “Hey, look at me.”

Ushijima glances up at him and manages a smile that looks more like a grimace.

 

They organise to go to the clinic the following Wednesday. Oikawa marks it off on the calendar in their room with a big red circle so they don’t forget; for some reason he’s filled with dread each time he looks at it. Both of them keep it a secret from Kaede – not a day goes by where she doesn’t talk about her ‘future grandchildren’, at which Ushijima and Oikawa share a nervous glance. Oikawa tries to block it out during the days leading up to their appointment.

Once they get to the clinic they’re forced to swallow their nerves; Ushijima, while usually reserved, refuses to speak at all. Oikawa has to go and sign them in and talk to the receptionist, his stomach swimming, and he tries his best to smile airily and wave his hands about like he usually does. He hadn’t been able to eat anything that morning. They wait in the waiting room in absolute silence, hands folded in their laps and elbows touching. Not a word passes between them, though Oikawa is partly thankful for it – he’s pretty certain that he’d vomit if he were to open his mouth.

They’re called in separately; a nurse calls for Ushijima first, and he looks reluctant to go in without Oikawa, but with a little reassuring nod from the setter he obediently follows the nurse down a corridor and out of sight. Only a few minutes later does the same nurse come for Oikawa, this time leading him in the opposite direction.

The room Oikawa is shown to feels very big and he suddenly feels very small. It’s not like the small cosy room he’s used to with his usual doctor.

In situations like these he’d usually reach out to grab hold of Ushijima’s sleeve – but Ushijima isn’t here this time. The walls are bare and glaringly white, and the only furnishings in the room are a few machines, cabinets, chairs, and an examination table with stirrups, all gleaming steel and unnervingly clinical.

“Oikawa-san, welcome.” A voice startles him out of his reverie; his head jerks in the direction of the voice and he finds himself in the company of a tall, dark-haired woman with eyes that glimmer at him from behind her spectacles and the most elegant of beauty marks situated by her mouth. Her voice is surprisingly high and soft, and as she extends a hand Oikawa can’t help but reach out to shake it. The softness of her voice seems to warm the room.

“You… aren’t you Shimizu Kiyoko? Karasuno’s old volleyball manager?” Oikawa asks, narrowing his eyes a little.

The woman – Kiyoko, if Oikawa’s memory serves him correctly – flushes a little and nods her head, tucking a strand of dark hair behind her ear. “I’m surprised you remember me. But yes, that’s me.” She gestures to one of the seats near the desk. “Please, sit. I just want to ask you a few things.”

Oikawa tastes nostalgia on the back of his tongue. He wonders what she’s thinking – is she surprised that he’s here for a fertility check? Is she surprised that he came here due to the fact that he’s unable to conceive with someone who most people knew to be his enemy during their high school years? He and Kiyoko had graduated at the same time, after all, but if she’s at all surprised then she’s doing a marvellous job of not showing it.

“Let’s see…” Kiyoko taps the end of her pen against the clipboard she picks up off the desk, sitting and crossing one long leg over the other. “Ah, here we are. You’ve been unable to conceive despite having regular, unprotected intercourse for a number of months?”

Oikawa nods, picking nervously at the skin around his thumbnail.

She asks him how often they have sex, to which Oikawa says often – he hates that he blushes a little while doing it. She then asks after his medical history and whether or not he’s on any medications, or if he uses alcohol or illicit drugs, all of which Oikawa denies.

“And you’ve never had any problems with sex before?”

“Never,” Oikawa says, a laugh bursting past his lips before he can stop it. The smile Kiyoko gives him is muted, and he realises then that nothing he could say would possibly surprise her. “We fuck like rabbits, if you’ll pardon my language.”

Kiyoko nods, taking a few moments to scan the sheet of paper in her lap. It’s only when she reaches the bottom that she looks up, her expression growing cautious. “Oikawa-san, I want you to know that you can trust me. Whatever is said inside this room remains confidential, and since you’re such a high-profile athlete I understand that any… leaks of information could severely hurt your reputation.”

“Yeah,” Oikawa mumbles. “I know that. I almost didn’t come because of it – but this is important to me.”

Kiyoko nods, sparing him a sympathetic glance over the rims of her glasses. “Why aren’t you telling Ushijima-san about your hormonal misbalances?”

Oikawa is quite suddenly struck with a cold, cold dread. He remembers sitting in another doctor’s clinic after getting his testosterone injection, listening to the doctor telling him that his hormone levels were off. That things shouldn’t really change, not unless he wanted to stop his treatment. Of course he’d never paid it any attention then – to him, it had never been that big of a deal. He hadn’t realised that his hormones would affect him like this, at least not in this way – and he hadn’t told Ushijima. He hadn’t breathed a word.

He remembers staring down at those envelopes and feeling icy coldness spread throughout his chest cavity. He remembers reading the numbers and feeling a little… broken. Like an old, cracked watch.

Oikawa exhales shakily and closes his eyes. He can feel the tears spreading along his waterline and begs them not to fall. “I didn’t think it mattered.”

“Usually testosterone treatment doesn’t impact one’s ability to have children,” she explains. “A lot of tests have surfaced recently that support that notion. Often cases like this are due to individual anatomy and hormonal fluctuation. You said you menstruate regularly, but do you do it often?”

Oikawa’s throat feels unusually tight; it’s reminiscent of when he used to get in trouble as a child. When he used to get caught lying. “They… they happen sometimes. Not as much as they used to.”

Kiyoko flips the sheet of paper over the metal clasp and reads whatever’s written beneath it. “I managed to get some information on your hormone levels from your practitioner. From what I’ve gathered after talking to Ushijima-san, he doesn’t know about any of this. He doesn’t know that your progesterone is _this_ low, does he?”

Oikawa shakes his head, his voice cracking as it leaves him. “He doesn’t. I didn’t tell him. I didn’t want him to know.” He feels something in his throat lurch, and he’s forced to bring a shaking hand to his mouth and press it against his lips to stop himself from being sick. “I knew it would affect me, but not like this. I didn’t want him to worry.” _I didn’t want him to think I didn’t work properly._

Again Kiyoko begins tapping her pen against the clipboard for a few moments before standing up. “Hop up into the stirrups. I’ll take some tests just to make sure nothing more sinister is going on.”

Oikawa is almost entirely certain that he’d feel irrevocably violated had anyone other than Kiyoko been the one peering through the mouth of a speculum between his legs; he’d been in this position many times before (because he’d never sacrifice his health for a bit of discomfort), so it isn’t particularly scary. What _does_ scare him is why he’s here and what the tests might tell him. There’s no way of knowing now and the uncertainty makes him feel a little nauseous.

What is Ushijima doing? Oikawa supposes he’ll have to jack off into a cup – the thought is enough to make him laugh. It makes the whole situation a little bit easier, but the conversation he’d had with Kiyoko swiftly follows, and his stomach grows cold again.

When Kiyoko is finished she seals away the swabs and hands Oikawa a piece of paper with the appointment details on it. When he folds it up and puts it in his pocket, she leads Oikawa out of the room and down the same hall as before. The next room they enter is cosier, with a couch and a desk and a large bay window. Most importantly there’s no surgical equipment in sight.

Ushijima is already there, sitting on the couch with a rigid spine and nervous eyes. He’s never been to a place like this and has certainly never been made to masturbate into a cup before – all the urine samples he’d given before big matches seemed a whole lot less personal. Relief floods through him when he sees Oikawa, though, and the setter goes to sit down beside him as Kiyoko closes the door.

“Oikawa-san, the results from the smears will probably be ready in about a week. As for now, I can tell you what we already know.” She sits down opposite them and fixes her glasses on her nose; she moves reluctantly and Oikawa’s throat seizes up in anxiety. “Ushijima-san, your sperm count and virility is amongst the highest I’ve ever seen. It makes your inability to conceive particularly surprising.” Her eyes flick to Oikawa. “I believe the problem to lie in the fact that Oikawa-san’s hormone misbalances are preventing him from ovulating, but we won’t know for sure until the test results come back from the lab. Would I be able to see you both in about a week to discuss it then?” As she finishes her sentence she hands a piece of paper to Ushijima, who takes it and furrows his brow as he begins to read.

“Of course,” Oikawa replies, though his voice falls strangely flat. “Could I ask a question?”

Kiyoko nods as she jots down a date.

“As things are, what are the chances of me being able to get pregnant?”

She looks up as if she’s reluctant to answer and he catches the deep grimace in her expression. “At this stage? It’s not impossible, but it’s extremely unlikely.”

Oikawa feels like his entire weight has dropped away. His hands are cold as ice as they sit in his lap and he presses them together to try and ward off the shaking. Silently, he nods.

The journey home is silent.

“Did you know?” Ushijima asks when they let themselves inside the house; Kaede is out with the dogs and the place is utterly silent. “Did you know your hormone levels were off?” The piece of paper Kiyoko had given him is still clenched in his fist, presumably containing all the information that’s needed to give Oikawa away. It contains all the information about Oikawa’s low progesterone – information that Oikawa had purposefully kept from him. After all these years he didn’t expect to have Oikawa keeping secrets from him, and especially not something this serious. It makes his blood boil in his veins and his hands grow unusually hot.

Oikawa pales and shivers at the hard tone of Ushijima’s voice. He still feels numb, like he’s crumbling, and the tone of Ushijima’s voice is strange to him, almost like he’s… hurt. “I didn’t think it mattered.”

“Of course it mattered!”

Ushijima doesn’t mean to raise his voice, and certainly not to a shout. It’s more of a bellow, really, his voice bursting from deep within his chest, loud enough to make Oikawa’s bones shake in his body. The frustration pounds in his skull like a migraine – he’s angry at himself, angry at Oikawa for having kept such vital information from him, angry at _everything_.

Sure, he could have figured it out for himself if he’d done the research. He knows what progesterone is and what it does – but he hadn’t, because he’d trusted Oikawa to tell him what bits mattered and what bits didn’t, and he’d presumed that Oikawa’s hormones were fine. What he’d read in Kiyoko’s office was something Oikawa had never told him – something he’d never _suspected_ – and he feels betrayed, somehow. He’d meant to keep all his anger to himself, though, and he’d never meant to let his voice carry his hurt and his anger along with it. He never wanted to shout at Oikawa. And yet he had, his clenched fists shaking by his side and his teeth grinding together enough to make his jaw flex. Oikawa stares at him, face drained of blood, his lips trembling and parting in wake of the words that are stuck in his throat. His voice finally leaves him in a shattered croak.

“I’m… sorry.”

Ushijima’s fists have uncurled, his fingers rigid like they’re itching to reach out and _smash_ something – his eyes don’t blink, not once, not until they tear themselves away from Oikawa’s face and he traipses up the stairs without so much as a backwards glance.

Oikawa stands frozen amongst the shoes in the vestibule by the door, listening to a door slam from upstairs. He doesn’t realise that he’s crying until his tears spill over his lips and onto his tongue, hot and salty, and he raises a trembling hand to press it against his mouth in an attempt to muffle the sobs that follow. Whatever sensations of solidness he’d had before are gone now, and it’s as though he’s falling through and endless, icy void. His body won’t stop shaking and it’s not long until his knees give out and buckle beneath him, causing his back to hit the wall and his body to sink to the ground.

During thunderstorms when he was a child Oikawa would sit in the closet of his bedroom and press the heels of his hands to his eyes. He’d reasoned that if he kept his eyes shut for long enough, and pressed against them hard enough, that he’d wake up and everything would just be a bad dream – of course that was never the case, and in later years he’d laughed at the fact that he’d ever believed it could work. But now he finds himself in the same position as he’d been in all those years ago, with his head bowed and his hands pressed to his eyes, his teeth grit tightly and his entire body taut with distress. He wants everything to go away – he wants to just be able to wake up in Ushijima’s bed and find Ushijima snoring at his side smiling that sleepy smile with the sun coming through the window –

The next sob that leaves Oikawa is more like a wail. His hands are slick with tears and they slip away from the hollows of his eye sockets and up into his hair, which he grips between his fists and _pulls_ as though the pain could possibly take his mind off his reality. Is this it, then? Is this how things end? Is this when his and Ushijima’s relationship slowly begins to cool, to fizzle out like a firecracker at the end of its string? Will they eventually part ways with nothing but indifference?

To Oikawa there is nothing more terrifying than that.

He’s scared – he’s _so_ scared. He wants to crawl into Ushijima’s arms, because that’s what had always made him feel safe. He can’t do that now – Ushijima had yelled at him, voice rising like a storm, and now Oikawa is all on his own.

 

\--

 

Something changes between them after that.

Oikawa and Ushijima had always viewed change as a good thing, but this sort of change isn’t good, and both of them know it. Even Kaede can sense it, but for some reason it frightens her, and she elects to say nothing.

Ushijima begins to go on longer runs more often. He’s taken to heading into Sendai to use the municipal gym to train, and often he’s gone for hours, if not an entire day. Sometimes he doesn’t even tell Oikawa he’s leaving.

Oikawa, on the other hand, has stopped going for runs in the mornings. He can barely bring himself to get up in the mornings at all – all the hours Ushijima spends in Sendai Oikawa spends in bed, feeling sick to his stomach with guilt. On certain days he’s so suffocated by Ushijima’s scent that he goes into a frenzy and washes every piece of bed linen in the house just to try and separate himself from it and from the memories that it holds. He’s stopped stealing Ushijima’s clothes, too.

Where Oikawa used to have breakfast at eight o’clock, he now finds himself eating for the first time in the day more towards five in the evening, and even then he only eats when he remembers to. Sometimes he purposefully doesn’t, because why should he? What right does he have to eat _anything_ when he’d been so careless?

Perhaps in his youth Oikawa would have delighted in causing Ushijima pain, especially of the emotional kind. Because emotional pain is the kind of pain that lingers the longest; broken bones heal, but injured hearts can take a lifetime to recover. Now, though, he feels more worthless than dirt for having made such a petty, careless, _thoughtless_ mistake. For thinking he could keep something so important from Ushijima. Knowing that Ushijima trusted him enough to tell him – and yet he didn’t. Because he thought it didn’t matter.

_Of course it mattered!_

Whenever Oikawa is plagued by dreams he can hear the way Ushijima’s voice had raised to a bellow. Sometimes it comes to him in the form of storm clouds, other times in the form of violent waves. But he can never escape it, not really, not when the knowledge that he’d shattered Ushijima’s gentle temperament follows him everywhere he goes. Part of him wishes that Ushijima had just punched him – it would probably make things easier. Ushijima’s absence is so much worse to bear.

Ushijima tells Oikawa to go to the clinic appointment on his own. He says that he’s busy with something in Sendai (Oikawa wasn’t listening – he can’t remember what). Oikawa agrees without a fight but ends up sleeping through the alarm anyway. Not that it matters – he knows that Kiyoko will only tell him what he already knows.

He wonders how much wider the gap between them will get. Maybe Ushijima will find someone else and fall in love with them. Maybe he’ll see the same fire and passion that he’d seen in Oikawa – a fire and passion that have effectively burned out and given way to a tired, malfunctioning almost-thirty year old. He’d probably prefer someone younger and fresher than Oikawa anyway, right? Someone with a bright smile. Someone who could give him lots of little sons and daughters. Someone who _works properly_.

 

\--

 

Oikawa stares at his gaunt face in the bathroom mirror. It’s three o’clock in the afternoon and he’d only just gotten out of bed. His lips are cracked and his eyes always seem to be red, now, swollen and colourless. He cries too much but somehow he can’t stop.

He should probably move back with his parents. His suitcase is still stored at the top of the linen closet. After all, there’s no point in burdening Ushijima with his presence anymore.

 

* * *

 

 

He’s forced back into action when the national team begins training again.

Suddenly he and Ushijima are thrust into close quarters again, what with being the team’s star players, and it’s strange – even more so to work with him on the court. The ace is in top physical form, as usual, and the coach and other team members seem to be satisfied with that, even impressed. If this had been a high school-level or college-level team, slacking off over a break might be tolerated – but as things stand, the national team doesn’t have the freedom to slack off, so when Oikawa finds his stamina severely impacted, it doesn’t go unnoticed. His body is weaker than it had been before; he crumples under hard impacts with the ball when receiving, and more than a few of his tosses are wildly inaccurate.

“Oikawa!” the coach bellows, and Oikawa flinches; he glances towards Ushijima, but the ace isn’t looking at him. Slowly, he pulls off his practice jersey and heads over to where the coach stands with his arms folded. “What’s wrong with you? You’re all over the place. Pull yourself together, all right?”

Oikawa nods and apologises.

Volleyball helps takes his mind off things. Slowly he begins to get back into the swing of things, readapting to his teammates playing methods and recovering himself little by little. He still tosses to Ushijima, though not nearly as often, and Ushijima rarely calls for them. In fact, he seems entirely more reserved, and the brightness he used to show whenever they won is now considerably dim.

 

* * *

 

 

At one point Oikawa is reined in to do some administration work for the team – he hadn’t gotten time to tell Ushijima about it, though, so he’d suspected that the ace had just gone home without him. But just as the sun begins to set and Oikawa is _finally_ released from stacks of paperwork, he catches sight of Ushijima in one of the gyms, alone, his only company a bin of volleyballs.

He watches silently through one of the barred windows. Ushijima hits serve after serve – he must have done hundreds by now. His wrists and palms are raw and throbbing, looking like the skin is about ready to break. Sweat courses over his face and his neck and his knees shake with exertion, but he still doesn’t stop. He’ll work himself to death at this point – but Oikawa doesn’t disturb him. He listens silently to Ushijima’s grunts of pain. And yet he still doesn’t stop.

Oikawa heads to the station by himself.

 

* * *

 

 

There soon come moments when Oikawa begins to lose himself. Everything begins to catch up with him and he finds himself overwhelmed with grief at the most inopportune times of the day – for instance, while he kneels on the ground sorting and folding laundry. One moment he’s folding a t-shirt and the next he’s doubled over in pain that blossoms from his solar plexus, pushing tears and sobs up through his diaphragm.

He tries his best to calm his breathing, lifting his shirt to wipe at his tear-soaked face. He smooths down his hair, purposefully not looking in the mirror, and struggles back to his feet again. Because _god damn it,_ he’s Oikawa Tōru and Oikawa Tōru does _not_ give up.

The air seems to have dissipated; Oikawa can’t breathe, and with a desperate gasp he yanks open the front door and practically falls out over the threshold. He can see perfectly, and yet he feels like a blind man, throwing open the gate and heading blindly down the tarmac road. He doesn’t know where he’s going, but he keeps walking until his knees stop shaking and his eyes don’t feel so hot, until the distraught tremors in his chest begin to lessen. Until the hot tarmac runs into dust, the road ruts deeply.

Every couple of hundred feet he wipes at his face again. His eyes feel so raw – he knows he looks a mess. He _feels_ a mess. Everything is going wrong and he can’t handle it all. Not this time. Not on his own. He wishes he could go up to Ushijima, slap him, and tell him to snap out of it. He really does.

Oikawa slows to a stop. Looking around, he realises that he isn’t sure where he is – he must have headed down some small side-alley or something, because the road has tapered to a small trodden path. He breathes in; he’s in the forest, now, the trees arching higher than he’s ever seen before. It lets him breathe easier, and his body doesn’t feel quite so heavy.

The path winds and twists and is often blocked by a fallen tree or overgrown bush; Oikawa presses on, though, because at this point he doesn’t really care if he gets lost and starves to death.

He breathes in the cool forest air, tasting the pine and the fresh maple on the back of his tongue. The morning dew still clings to some of the undergrowth, glittering in the sunlight reaching through the canopy, and for a moment Oikawa mistakes them for diamonds of the shimmering wings of spirits. He has no idea where he’s going but the soft sound of the leaves overhead makes the prospect a lot less frightening.

After wandering a few more hundred feet, Oikawa sees a flash of red ahead of him. He uses his hands to push aside the bracken, shouldering past the ferns and the shoulder-high grass, the feathery blades kissing along his cheeks as he goes. The trees grow closer and closer together, as though they’re trying to crush him, until all of a sudden they yawn open and reveal an old, tumbling staircase that leads to a shrine gate.

 _It must be ancient,_ Oikawa thinks as he gazes up the stairs. The paint of the shrine gate had once been red, that much is obvious, but the elements have faded it to a colour Oikawa can’t quite place. It’s brighter than the trees, but only just. The steps look as though not a single foot has passed up them in decades – ivy clings to them, the lichen thriving and unbroken, whole chunks of stone lying broken and crumbling from where the land had evidently moved and sent part of the hill sinking, taking the stair along with it.

Part of him wants to turn around and leave. Something about this place is ancient and forbidden – which is exactly why Oikawa chooses to stay. He begins up the steps, each broad slab of stone worn down in the middle from the ancient passage of endless feet, his old sneakers retracing a pilgrimage that hasn’t been undertaken for god knows how long. The forest falls silent around him, as though everything is watching him. By the time he reaches the top the gate looms dark and silent over him, the tattered paper charms fluttering in the wind.

If Oikawa strains his ears he can hear the sounds of tinkling bells in the distance, but he doesn’t know where they’re coming from. He can’t see anybody and the place seems to be overrun with nature. Abandoned.

He follows the sounds of the bells, crossing a wide stone courtyard that’s slightly sloped from where the side of the hill had sunk; there are low buildings around it, but all of them are empty, the frames of the shōji doors paperless and mouldy. They yawn at him, a crowd of empty black eyes.

“You, yes, you, who are you?”

Oikawa almost jumps out of his skin. He whips around, his heart seeming to do a circuit of his body, and sees a crooked old woman sitting cross-legged on one of the lichened verandas skirting the courtyard. She sits facing him clad in orange robes and with a brightly-printed scarf wrapped about her head. The skin of her face droops softly in deep creases that reminds Oikawa very much of silk, and he can’t see so much as a glint of iris from her eyes, which are squinted almost shut. Despite her age, though, she sits with no cushioning between her and the wood.

Oikawa swears he hadn’t seen her there before.

“I’m… Oikawa Tōru,” he says, oddly undeterred from giving his name to a stranger.

“You – you’re from the Ushijima house. Yes, yes, I know you, I know you. I know you and I know your pain. You’re in pain, aren’t you?”

“You can’t know me,” Oikawa says nervously, taking a few steps towards her. “You… I’ve never met you before. Who are _you_?”

The old woman smiles at him – it’s an odd smile, like the face of a fox, and for some reason Oikawa shivers at the sight of it.

“Me? Not important. You –,” She raises a bony finger and points right at his chest. “You may not know me, but I know you. I know everyone. _Especially_ you.” Oikawa’s eyes follow her finger as she lowers her hand until she’s pointing at his abdomen. Oikawa stands rigid, unable to move, unable to speak. “And this.”

Her hand returns to her lap and she unfolds herself from her sitting position. “Come with me.”

Oikawa doesn’t know why he follows her. The way her feet never seem to touch the flagstones draws him forwards, and he follows the bright beacon of her headscarf until he arrives at a small kiosk hidden amongst a copse of maple trees. She takes him inside; it’s cramp and smells musty, but when Oikawa looks out of the kiosk’s front opening he’s suddenly faced with the path he used to run with Ushijima.

“You’re the nun from the kiosk,” he says, shocked, turning quickly back to where the old woman is unwrapping a soft cotton package. She nods, humming, and delicately lifts something into her palm, holding it out to Oikawa.

“Have this,” she tells him as she places a small stone fox in his upturned palms. Her skin is soft and startlingly cold to the touch, but for some reason Oikawa doesn’t flinch, nor does he pull away. He looks down at the fox; it’s carved of white stone and has eyes set with glittering amber. It’s unsettling to look at, as though it’s alive, or as though there’s a spirit trapped inside it whose only window out is through the small amber beads.

“It’s beautiful… why give me this, though?”

“You love him, silly boy, yes, silly. You love him yet you hurt and he hurts too, can you see it, can you? You can. But, silly boy, you are blind, yes, blind. This may help you see, or maybe not, maybe not. But nothing – _nothing_ – will help unless you believe that it matters.” Her expression is sharp as she looks at him, her hands closing his fingers fully over the ornament in his hands.

_Of course it matters!_

“It matters,” he says softly, and bows. When he looks up she’s gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> what's going on in this story anymore
> 
> who the fuck knows honestly


	8. Isolation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey guys i'm currently suffering in bed from a nasty gastro bug so i figured what better else to do than to finally get around to publishing chapter 8!!!! certainly not studying for that exam i have in a few days lmao...
> 
> also thank you so much to my beautiful beta reader kuroimachi for your CONSTANTLY WONDERFUL WORK. ilysm.
> 
>  **squick warning** : oikawa has a nightmare towards the end of this chapter that involves a minimal amount of body-horror. Just throwing out a warning, but it's nothing extensive.

Oikawa looks around and is abruptly filled with uneasiness. He ducks out of the kiosk and shoulders through the foliage, bursting out onto the path he used to run with Ushijima. It’s so familiar and yet so strange now that he finds himself standing at the very end of it – how has he managed to walk so far in what felt like such a short time?

The walk home is long and the sun is unrelenting against the back of his neck. By the time he reaches the Ushijimas’ gate he’s sweating and is pretty sure he’s sunburned, the fox still clasped in his left hand, fingers closed tightly around it. The sky has already dripped into the evening, everything saturated with gold and crimson as the sun boils on the horizon.

His heart is heavy in his chest as he lets himself inside. The house is empty again, just as he’d left it. The laundry still lies out on the floor and Oikawa sets the little fox down on the television to finish the folding.

Ushijima arrives back from Sendai just as he’s finishing. By the time he takes off his shoes the evening is blue and cold, and Oikawa gets up to close all but one of the shōji doors leading to the veranda. He’s surprised when Ushijima makes a bee-line straight for him, and when he turns he sees Ushijima placing a sweating bottle of sake down on the coffee table.

Neither of them are very big drinkers – they’d drunk a lot in college merely because the experience was new and thrilling for them, sure, but now they’re older and the novelty has worn off. But despite Oikawa’s indifference towards alcohol, the moment he sets his eyes on the sake he knows he could use a break. Ushijima wordlessly goes to the kitchen to get two cups, returning to set them down and drop cross-legged onto the mats. He looks so ridiculous that Oikawa almost laughs – he would, perhaps, if he wasn’t feeling so miserable. So instead of laughing he sits down as well, taking the cup Ushijima offers him and waiting in silence until it’s filled.

They don’t talk. Not a single word is said between them, which is really for the best, as there are few words that could make things better and many words that could make things a whole lot worse. Neither Ushijima nor Oikawa is willing to risk making things worse.

It’s Ushijima who breaks first. The bottle is half-empty by that time and one big hand rubs over his face, pinching the bridge of his nose between his fingers. His cheeks are flushed only a little bit.

“Why did you lie?”

His voice sounds so broken – so pitiful. So betrayed. Oikawa downs what’s left in his cup and fills it up again.

“I didn’t lie.”

“It’s all the same to me, Oikawa.”

“Because I didn’t want you to _worry_!” Oikawa cries, almost cutting Ushijima off before he can finish. He hates how his hands are shaking and how his heart won’t stop fluttering in his throat. “I knew you’d worry and I didn’t want you to think there was something wrong with me. I ignored it because I didn’t want to believe it, either – I thought it wouldn’t impact us.” Emotion clogs his throat and he tries to clear it out with a cough, but it doesn’t work. “I didn’t want to ruin everything.”

Ushijima takes another drink. His eyes remain steady on Oikawa as he does so, and before either of them know it there’s only a quarter-bottle left between them. Oikawa glances briefly at the proof displayed on the back of the bottle and grimaces.

“I hate this,” he says, and Ushijima doesn’t look at him. “I hate myself. I hate myself so much.” He wants to apologise for not working properly.

Warmth spreads across the back of his neck; Oikawa realises a little late that it’s Ushijima’s hand curling around the nape of his neck. It’s been so long since Ushijima has touched him so intimately – Oikawa shivers at the touch, his shoulders jumping a little.

“Do you hate me, too?”

Ushijima shakes his head. “No,” he mumbles, his voice hoarse and cracking as it passes his lips. “No.” _I could never._

Licking his lips, Oikawa thinks back to when he’d been folding the laundry. When he’d been thinking about all the time Ushijima has been spending in Sendai – about the possibility of him meeting something young and fresh and fragrant and fun. Something he could love completely, something that’s shiny rather than dusty. Oikawa feels dusty like a broken ornament forgotten on a back shelf. It’s been weeks since Ushijima last looked at him like he’s worth something.

“I’d be bored, too,” he continues, his voice wobbling as he drains the last of the sake from the bottle into his cup. “Who would’ve thought I’d age so badly, hm?”

“Oikawa –,”

“I should _go_. I need to go away. Somewhere.” He’s not making sense to his own ears, but he can’t stop talking. He stares down at his hands as though it could somehow will away the tears that have begun to pool in his eyes. “Somewhere else. I don’t work, I’m –,”

Oikawa’s voice is abruptly cut off as Ushijima vaults to his knees, knocking the empty sake bottle aside as he reaches out to grasp Oikawa by the jaw and drag him in to kiss him. It’s too clumsy to really be called a kiss; it’s more of a mash of tongue and teeth than anything, but Oikawa groans anyway, his cup rolling from his limp fingers and spilling onto the floor.

“How _dare_ you,” Ushijima growls against his lips. “Don’t you _ever_ say things like that.”

Chills shoot up Oikawa’s spine and he swallows thickly, vision blurring. “But it’s true.”

Ushijima’s grip on him tightens, their lips only just touching. They can taste each other’s breath and smell each other’s skin. “You’re a liar. I don’t like it when you lie.” The tone of his voice is hard and cold as ice.

Oikawa, his head swimming, sneers. “Go find yourself something prettier to fuck, Ushiwaka-chan.”

Ushijima’s nostrils flare with anger and his hand drops from Oikawa’s jaw to his neck, shoving the setter down onto the floor so he’s sprawled out on his back, staring up at Ushijima with glittering eyes and the vile sneer still plastered on his face. Before Oikawa’s vision can stop spinning, Ushijima’s hand fists in the front of his shirt and tears it open; the flimsy buttons split away from the seam as easily as anything, bearing Oikawa’s pale, supple skin. Ushijima doesn’t try to conceal his gaze as his eyes roam hungrily over the setter’s unblemished neck – he’s not used to seeing it without any markings and the need to suck a few dark hickeys rises in his chest and becomes almost unbearable.

“I don’t want something prettier,” the ace snarls, leaning down between Oikawa’s legs and taking the setter’s thighs into his hands and spreading them to accommodate his own body. “I don’t want _anything_ else. I’ve never wanted anything else other than you.”

Oikawa’s hand fists in Ushijima’s hair when the ace’s lips find his neck, and he jerks hard at the dark hair only partly to try and break their contact.

“I don’t believe you. How could I b-believe – ah –,” His head lolls drunkenly to the side as a sudden pressure blooms between his legs; Ushijima thrusts a hard thigh between Oikawa’s legs, rubbing it along the apex between them.

Ushijima’s eyes are aflame as he pulls back, his lips flushed, and it’s very hard for Oikawa to not feel a little frightened. But despite the fear, his heart trips over himself in excitement, his hands strangely steady as they press against his chest.

The ace pulls Oikawa’s shirt off, his hands uncharacteristically clumsy as they drop to fumble at his waistband. His movements are drunken and his breath smells like alcohol and regret; even though Oikawa tries to push his hands away, his lips find the hard line of Ushijima’s jaw and he latches onto the skin with his teeth, biting down hard enough to make Ushijima flinch in pain. Ushijima pulls back only long enough to tear Oikawa’s pants from his legs and toss them across the room before pinning the setter down with his weight and grinding his still-clothed erection against Oikawa’s bare skin.

“ _Stop_ , you’re drunk – _I’m_ drunk –,” Oikawa barely has time to mumble before Ushijima’s tongue is in his mouth again, hot and angry and swollen, and he’s unable to do anything else other than moan and suck it between his lips, lathing at it with his own tongue. His hands move without his permission, scrabbling at the soft front of Ushijima’s t-shirt; once the ace realises what he’s trying to do he shucks it off over his head, pressing the searing hot skin of their bodies flush together, grinding the length of his body along Oikawa’s.

“You want me to fuck something pretty?” Ushijima asks in Oikawa’s ear, a big, rough hand curling around his throat. Oikawa nods, dazed, his lips swollen and red and aching to be kissed again. But Ushijima isn’t kissing his lips; he’s kissing his cheeks, his brow, the lids of his eyes, _everywhere_ on his face except where he wants it the most. He’s already feeling uncomfortably wet between the legs, which is embarrassing considering he’s no longer a flighty teenager.

A large part of him doesn’t want this. He doesn’t want to be pinned, suffocating, beneath Ushijima’s body; he doesn’t want to feel the way his muscles tense and relax in their flow of movement; he doesn’t _want_ Ushijima’s fingers to be feeling their way between his thighs. A large part of him is still upset and angry and guilty. But there is still a part of him that craves Ushijima’s touch and tongue and heat. A part that’s _missed_ him.

“ _Ah_ ,” he sighs, his arms slipping around Ushijima’s neck and pulling him closer, breathing in his scent. His legs melt apart, no matter what he tries to do to stop them, his feet rubbing impatiently at the material of Ushijima’s trousers in a clumsy attempt to yank them down.

The world swims around him and Oikawa can’t really tell when Ushijima shoves his pants down around his knees. All the can feel is searing heat against his thigh, a telltale stickiness against soft pubic hair that sends a jolt of arousal coursing through his body, strong enough to make his vision go fuzzy. He’s caught between shoving Ushijima away and pulling him closer, his hands pushing and tugging all at the same time.

“…don’t want anything else,” Ushijima grunts in his ear; he tries to push himself inside, but the alcohol has made him sloppy and he misses, the head of his cock instead pushing up between Oikawa’s folds and over his swollen clit. The setter lets out a high keen, stretching his lithe body out beneath Ushijima, instinctively spreading his legs farther apart to try and make the process easier. Ushijima has to pull back a little and actually watch what he’s doing in order to properly find that soft, wet hole. When he finally manages to sink his length into Oikawa’s body he lets his head tip back with a deep sigh, his hands savouring the softness of the setter’s skin beneath his palms.

Both of them know that this isn’t the proper path to forgiveness. Drunkenly fucking on the living room floor is more of a college mistake than reconciliation, but Ushijima had just been so _angry_ when Oikawa had suggested he go find someone else to start a life with. Even Ushijima, in his drunken haze, is surprised how that little cluster of ill-intended words could ever arouse such fury in him; he still isn’t sure why, exactly, but he doesn’t care. All he knows is anger and possessiveness over the body in his hands, over the soul that he’d thought would remain with him forever.

The thought of losing Oikawa makes him want to panic. Ushijima isn’t – has never been – the type of person to panic. He isn’t familiar with the tightness in his chest and the distinct lack of breath whenever he thinks about a life without Oikawa; he’s never felt anything like it before, and the first time it had happen Ushijima had fleetingly thought he was dying. Now he knows he wasn’t, but he’s half-convinced that if Oikawa should ever vanish he’d drop dead on the spot.

Because he loves him. Working or broken, young or old, rich or poor, ugly or beautiful. Ushijima is in love with something that evades his senses and his sensibility. It’s something that’s everywhere and nowhere, something he chooses not to think about, because he doesn’t believe he needs a reason to love someone this much.

Oikawa’s hands are gentle as they caress his cheeks. It’s only when he’s dragged from the pit of his own thoughts that he realises Oikawa is wiping at tears that stand proud as soldiers on his cheeks; his fingers shake as he does, but he does it all the same, and act that’s oddly diligent for the situation they’re in.

Ushijima had never been the type of child to cry at nightmares or dark corners. But the thought of Oikawa being taken from him is so terrifying that he can’t help himself; his eyes burn, his vision crossing and blurring and turning Oikawa’s beautiful, heartbroken face into a pale cloud beneath him.

His hips pound hard – their movements are sloppy but powerful, and Oikawa gasps for breath, his face crumpling. “Don’t throw me away,” he sobs, and while Ushijima’s vision is still too blurred to see, he knows that he’s not the only one crying. “Please don’t throw me away.”

Ushijima scoops the setter into his arms and buries his face in his neck. Oikawa’s body is so fragrant – it feels as beautiful as it looks. “You’d have to kill me first.”

Words slur off after that. Ushijima tries his best to press his lips to every available inch of Oikawa’s skin, but he’s too drunk to remember which parts he’s already kissed and which parts he hasn’t, so he just settles for kissing and murmuring inaudible words against the ridges of Oikawa’s throat.

The next thing he knows is that Oikawa has fallen asleep, his thighs sticky and his alcohol-fuelled lust sated, at least for a while. His breath blows softly against Ushijima’s collarbone, and for the first time in weeks he looks truly peaceful.

It takes almost two hours for Ushijima’s head to finally settle. He wants nothing more than to fall asleep as well, but he’d rather not leave Oikawa naked on the floor of his living room. So he picks Oikawa up into his arms as soon as he’s sure he won’t tumble over, carrying him up the stairs to the bedroom where he drops the setter into bed before getting in himself.

He lies there, his head propped up on his hand, gazing down at Oikawa as he sleeps. He really does look peaceful – all the sorrowful creases in his face have smoothed out, his long lashes fluttering against his cheeks. He looks like a teenager again, Ushijima thinks with a small, nostalgic smile, stroking the back of his fingers down over Oikawa’s cheek. The setter sighs at the touch, turning his face into the gesture and snuggling closer to the heat of Ushijima’s body. When Ushijima glances at the clock and sees it’s almost midnight, he switches off the bedside lamp and pulls Oikawa close to him, letting himself gently drift away to sleep.

 

* * *

 

 

Ushijima wakes up to the sound of Oikawa vomiting across the hall. His instincts kick in and within one second flat he’s on his feet, rounding the end of the bed so he can see through the open doorway into the bathroom. Oikawa is sat back on his haunches with his head cushioned on his arms above the toilet bowl. As if he can tell Ushijima is looking at him, he glances up, eyes bleary and hair dishevelled.

“What the fuck was _in_ that stuff? Are you sure it was sake?” he demands in a croak. Ushijima nods – he’d asked for something strong and the little old man at the corner store had handed him the bottle from beneath the counter.

Oikawa shakes his head and turns back to the toilet with a groan. Ushijima decides to leave him be.

His own head is throbbing a little bit, and amidst the headache there’s a distinct niggle of a migraine that Ushijima hopes won’t develop into anything nasty. His eyes hurt like a bitch and his body aches for some reason – his memories of the night before are still clear, however, at least until some point after he and Oikawa had started fucking. This, Ushijima thinks, is the first time he’s ever felt bad about having sex with Oikawa Tōru in his life. Even though he can’t recall parts of it.

Ushijima briefly considers going back to sleep to try and temper his headache, but he knows that now he’s up he won’t be able to fall asleep again, especially not with the loud retching noises coming from the bathroom. So he pulls on a sweater instead, heading downstairs to make a few pieces of toast for the both of them. It’s the most unelaborate breakfast he’s ever made: dry toast and water. His stomach probably couldn’t handle anything else until the stagnant alcohol has stopped thrumming through his veins.

He hears the shower running from upstairs and sets Oikawa’s toast in the oven to keep it warm (because the only thing worse than dry toast is _cold_ dry toast – might as well take a bite out of a cardboard box). He picks up a piece of his own toast, biting into it, and wandering into the living room. The empty bottle of sake is still on the ground, the mats beneath it stained with only a tiny trickle of what had been left. Luckily there are no other stains to speak of – he’ll still have to clean the mats again anyway, though.

Ushijima feeds the dogs and refills their water, opening the house up to let in the fresh morning air. The repetition of his usual morning jobs is comforting, as menial as it may seem, and as the carbs hit his stomach and the outside air sinks into his skin he already begins to feel a little better. He’s just finishing off the crust when he heads to the altar to replace the incense bowl, which is now full of ash and the stump of the stick. But just as he’s about to pick it up and throw the ash into the flowerbed, something catches his eye; a small fox is perched on the corner of the altar. He doesn’t remember putting it there – in fact, he’s never seen it before. There’s something familiar about it, though, with its strange white stone and glittering amber eyes. He feels suddenly a little disconcerted, as though he’s seen it somewhere before. He turns the stone over in his hand. It’s warm.

“I smell food – where is it.” Oikawa’s voice rings loud and annoyed as he stomps down the stairs in a decidedly bad mood. When Ushijima doesn’t reply, he peers into the living room and sees him standing holding the little amber-eyed fox in a broad, rough hand.

“Where did you get this?” Ushijima asks, the leftover toast crumbs feeling dry and gravelly on the back of his tongue.

“Oh, that? Some old nun gave it to me. From the shrine near the rice paddies.”

Ushijima puts down the statue and, for a moment, is incredibly still. Then without any warning he strides towards Oikawa, pushing past him and taking the stairs two at a time in his bolt towards his room.

“Hey, what –,” Oikawa exclaims when Ushijima’s shoulder hits him square in the chest. “What are you doing? Ushiwaka!” He follows him up the stairs at a run, and when he finally swings around the doorway to Ushijima’s room he finds him flinging open the doors of his wardrobe and reaching up to the uppermost shelf to pull down a small shoebox. Oikawa can only watch as Ushijima gets to his knees, flipping over the lid of the box. Oikawa slowly gets to his knees beside him, his curiosity overwhelming him entirely.

The box, Oikawa sees, is filled with nothing particular. Small flipbooks, plastic and wooden toys, a keyring or two. A pair of mittens with cows stitched onto the backs. A few medals that have lost their shine, and a few plaques Oikawa realises to be volleyball awards from elementary and middle school. Ushijima’s hands seem almost _too_ big as he rifles through the junk.

 _A memory box…?_ Oikawa wonders – it’s only then that he suddenly realises he’s essentially looking into a portal to Ushijima’s childhood. He’d never thought about it before, but apart from a few of the framed photographs Kaede hangs on the walls, he’s never seen anything from Ushijima’s childhood. Neither of them have ever really talked about it, either, and now Oikawa’s being confronted with all of Ushijima’s past loves and passions. His secrets. It’s oddly like looking at a chopped-off limb, Oikawa thinks. Had those powerful hands ever been small? Had they ever been soft? Thinking of them wearing the little cow mittens is the most ridiculous thing that’s crossed Oikawa mind – and yet it’s endearing, in a way.

Finally, Ushijima finds what he’s looking for.

At the very bottom of the box is a statue very much like Oikawa’s, except brown rather than white, and with eyes much darker. Ushijima brings it up to eye-level, into the open light, and Oikawa sees that it’s actually exactly the same – the white stone had turned brown with the passage of many hands, the amber eyes having darkened with age. But they still glitter with that undeniable likeness.

“It’s the same,” he observes softly – a useless remark, perhaps. He gently takes it out of Ushijima’s fingers and turns it over in his palm. “When did you get this?”

“When I was very young,” Ushijima explained in that same, quiet voice. “During my parents’ separation, if I recall correctly. I was upset and happened across the shrine by accident and found the nun there. She gave me this, though I’ve never been sure what for. I just… I remember holding it whenever I was distressed.”

“Maybe it’s some kind of black magic,” Oikawa murmurs. Ushijima lets out a little huff of laughter at that.

“Maybe.”

There’s a heartbeat of pause in the room before Oikawa turns his cheek against the soft weave of Ushijima’s shirt shoulder. “I’m sorry. For everything. I’ve just… been feeling so overwhelmed. _About_ everything.”

Ushijima glances from the fox to the man sitting beside him, and at the sight of Oikawa’s sadness – the type of sadness that engulfs every fibre of one’s body – his chest grows tight. He slips an arm around Oikawa’s waist, drawing comforting circles into his hip and kissing the top of his head. “Don’t apologise.” He hates how his voice cracks when he speaks. “I should have been there for you through all of this. I shouldn’t have – I shouldn’t have gotten so angry. I shouldn’t have left you alone, I shouldn’t have –,”

“Shh,” Oikawa cuts him off, gently taking the ace’s face into his hands and kissing him. He can feel stubble beneath his fingers; it’s so unlike Ushijima to let his appearance fall into disarray like this. “If there’s one thing I know about you, Ushijima Wakatoshi, it’s that you prefer solitude. Especially when you’re upset.” With an icy laugh he pulls back and swipes his fingers against his eyes. “I thought you’d just… gotten sick of me.”

“Gotten…?” Ushijima’s expression is so outraged it borders on anger. “Tōru, I would _never_ get sick of you. I could never. I still feel the same thrill now that I did in high school.”

How could he say something so openly embarrassing? And with such a straight face? Oikawa can’t help but laugh at the ridiculousness of it all, and yet he somehow manages to cry as well – Ushijima pulls him into his arms, holding him tightly until the tears dry up and Oikawa hugs back as tightly as he can, determined to never let go.

“Forgive me,” Ushijima says in a whisper.

“Let’s just… move on, all right?” Oikawa replies with a watery smile, smoothing Ushijima’s hair back from his face. “The baby thing won’t work, at least we know that for certain now. So let’s just move on, okay?”

Ushijima nods and kisses him.

 

* * *

 

 

“Must you go?” Kaede asks with a frown as Ushijima hauls his suitcase up the last flight of stairs and onto the train platform. He goes and kisses her with a rueful smile.

“We’ll come and visit soon, I promise,” he tells her just as Oikawa jumps down the steps to give the dogs – who pull nervously at their leashes – one last cuddle farewell.

Now that the glory of the Olympics has passed, Ushijima and Oikawa’s break is over. They need to head back to Tokyo to begin their training again – after all, volleyball isn’t a matter of just turning up at the Olympics and winning gold every four years. It’s a constant, and it’s their lives. Neither of them really want to leave the sleepy little cradle of the Miyagi mountains, but as sad as they are to go, they both have an itch to be in the big city and to feel the excitement of the professional court again.

“All set.” Oikawa kisses Kaede’s cheek and hugs her. “Call, all right?”

She nods, standing on the platform as she watches Ushijima and Oikawa get onto the train. She waves until they’re out of sight.

Oikawa sighs and leans back against the seat, holding his suitcase between his knees as the train begins to pick up speed. Things aren’t the same as they were – he hardly believes they ever will be, but that’s the nature of change. Of development. He’s just thankful that the peace between him and Ushijima has been restored, however fickle that peace may be. _It’ll probably get easier in Tokyo_ , he thinks as he watches the mountains race by out the window. Tokyo is as much of a home as Miyagi is to them, after all.

Their exchange in Sendai is quick and relatively painless. Oikawa almost gets his ankle stuck in the door of the train, but since it’s a high-speed bullet they’re able to sit by the windows and avoid the sardine-like squeezes of the local trains, for which they’re both thankful.

Nothing makes Oikawa feel old quite as much as the train journey from Sendai to Tokyo does. He busies himself with social media or a crossword and Ushijima often takes to reading a book – he feels like an old man now that he’s moved past the constant chatter of his youth. They just sit there in a comfortable silence, occasionally talking about their upcoming training or the state of the weather. But they don’t need to talk, not really. They know each other too well by now.

After graduating college and getting scouted for the national team, Ushijima had bought a small inner-city apartment as a surprise. It was nothing impressive, but it was enough to house them during their stays in Tokyo; with two bedrooms and one bathroom it hadn’t been too bad of a squeeze. They still have it years later, and that’s where they end up after leaving the station in Tokyo.

It smells stale and stuffy – the first thing Oikawa does is open a few of the windows to let in the sound of traffic and the bitter (but fresh) air from outside. It’s odd to hear so much noise in such close proximity, but there’s a certain charm to it, just like there is looking out the window and seeing buildings instead of trees.

Unlike the Ushijima house, the apartment is all clean angles and white marble. What money they could’ve used to buy a new apartment they’d used to refurbish this one, transforming it from something shabby into something beautiful. Everything is different – their bed, the kitchen sink, the television. But it’s all so familiar, like a world once visited in a dream.

“Welcome home,” Ushijima says to nobody in particular.

 

* * *

 

 

“I’m glad to see you’re all doing well. I hope everyone’s settling in well enough.” The coach taps his knuckles against a clipboard and looks over his team’s line-up. “I know we’ve been going a bit easy lately, but it’s time to ramp things up, so be prepared for that, and no slacking off.”

Oikawa is practically buzzing. It takes all the self-control he has not to start bouncing on the balls of his feet – even Ushijima, who stands to his left, can feel it, and shoots him a glance out of the corner of his eye. Oikawa’s wearing that confident little smirk again, and it thrills the ace to see him in his national jersey again. In the same uniform as Ushijima himself, the way Oikawa so proudly squares his shoulders.

“But before we do, I have an announcement to make.” The coach sweeps his eyes down the line of starters – did Oikawa imagine the old man’s gaze lingering on him for a little longer than normal? No. He probably imagined it. “I want to introduce a new and incredibly talented pair of members to this team. I’m sure most of you have seen them at tournaments, or at least heard of them before – this is Kageyama Tobio and Hinata Shōyō. They’ll be playing with you from now on, so take care of them.”

Oikawa freezes.

Right on cue, Kageyama Tobio steps up beside the coach and bows deeply and hilariously rigidly. “Please take care of me!” Beside him stands Hinata, smiling like he’d just swallowed the sun. But Oikawa can only focus on Kageyama and the icy cold dread that fills his body at the sight of him.

Oh, yes. He’s just the same as Oikawa remembers him to be.

He’s still lanky and incredibly tall, with the same dark hair falling into his eyes and the same angular face and infuriatingly serious expression; Oikawa swells with a mix of anger and dismay, his nails biting into his wrist where his hands are clasped behind his back. He takes a shaky breath in through his nose as his teammates begin to murmur – he can’t hear their words, but he can detect tones of awe, and it makes him feel sick.

“Oikawa.” Oikawa starts a little as the coach points a pen at him. “Sit out for a bit. I want to see how these two play.”

“Yes, sir.” Oikawa’s voice betrays nothing – it’s smooth and even and indifferent, hiding the way Oikawa’s chest begins to crumble with shame. Being benched is tough enough, but on their first training session…?

A whistle screams from across the court and the team kicks into action. Oikawa doesn’t hear it. His eyes are fixed on the court, his body and his senses numbed, until one of his teammates claps him on the shoulder and jerk him back to reality. Oikawa jogs over to the bench without complaint, his face hot with humiliation as he takes his seat.

He hasn’t watched Ushijima play without him for… for longer than he can remember. Sure, a few times in their early years they’d been rotated off, but ever since they’d shown their skill and had secured their places as regulars, they’d always played together. But this is different. Even when Oikawa had just joined the team, he’d never been called in to replace the team’s standing setter.

_It’s happening all over again._

Oikawa watches Kageyama as he plays; his form is as flawless as ever, his limbs long and powerful. It’s awful – Oikawa swallows dryly and wipes his palms on his shorts. He thought he’d finally escaped Kageyama, but now he sees that isn’t the case at all. He should have known that he’d follow him right until the end.

After a few matches Oikawa is rotated back in again. He can feel Kageyama’s eyes on him, but he doesn’t meet his gaze, not once. In fact, he entirely ignores him, and once he’s back on the court he feels a whole lot easier. Ushijima’s voice calls for his tosses, the ball ricochets off the court, sneakers squeak, whistles blow. _This_ is the world he lives for. This – beyond anything else – is where he belongs.

But Kageyama is still watching him. He’s watching him in that infuriating, analytical way that Oikawa hates so much, as though he’s analysing him and committing each turn of muscle to memory. Oikawa begins to falter under the gaze, his attention waning where it shouldn’t, his eyes drifting towards Kageyama when it should still be focussed on the ball.

_He’ll follow you right until the end._

He remembers back to Seijō’s match against Karasuno, how Kageyama and Hinata had dragged their team to victory. _He’ll follow you and he’ll beat you. Because he’s a genius and you’re not._

_There’s no way out – you can’t run from this._

“Oikawa!” Ushijima bellows from his right; he’s bounding towards the net for a spike, his powerful thighs launching him into the air.

Oikawa imagines having to watch as Ushijima receives tosses from Kageyama instead of him.

Panicking, Oikawa lets the ball roll from his fingertips towards Ushijima; it falls just short, though, glancing off the ridge of the ace’s hand rather than the centre of his palm. It goes spinning across the court, rebounding outside the lines and causing the umpire’s whistle to shriek.

“Sorry –,”

“Oikawa!” the coach yells, waving his clipboard about to bring the game to a standstill. “I don’t know why you’ve been so distracted these last few months, but it can’t continue. I know you’re the vice-captain of this team, but if you keep playing _this_ badly then I’ll be forced to forfeit your position as a regular and give it to somebody else instead.” He glances over to Kageyama, who’s sitting with his back straight as a board. By this time the entire team has stopped to look at them. “Go pull yourself together.”

Nodding, Oikawa leaves the court. He keeps his eyes on the ground to make sure nobody can see his tears – he doesn’t need anymore humiliation.

“Oikawa-san –,”

“Stay away from me!” Oikawa barks in Kageyama’s direction, jogging the last few feet to the locker rooms.

 

“Fuck!” He kicks the side of the locker cabinet, the clang filling the empty room. The sounds from the court are dim and the only thing he can really hear is the passage of his own breaths. He’s hyperventilating – he can’t stop the huge, gulping breaths or the squeezing in his lungs. He feels like he’s dying. Oikawa has to sit down on one of the benches to stop himself from collapsing, hanging his head. _I need to calm down. Calm down and breathe._ He hasn’t felt like this since –

“Oikawa, what are you doing?”

Oikawa’s gaze jerks up, hurt, furious. Ushijima stands in the doorway of the locker room, sweat still fresh on his skin, his eyes bright with concern. For some reason, seeing him only makes breathing harder.

“Get out, Ushiwaka-chan!” Oikawa rasps.

But Ushijima doesn’t leave.

He approaches Oikawa and crouches down in front of him, placing both hands around Oikawa’s wrists. Since when had his hands started shaking? “Don’t –,”

“Breathe,” Ushijima tells him. His voice is low and even, and he strokes his thumbs up and down the insides of Oikawa’s wrists. “You can cry if you want to.”

As soon as he says those words, Oikawa’s chest heaves and he squeezes his eyes tightly shut. Tears boil on his cheeks and he lets his face sink into Ushijima’s shoulder as he cries and cries and cries.

“Everything’s going wrong,” he sob as Ushijima strokes the back of his neck. “Why is everything going wrong?”

“I’m here,” Ushijima murmurs, and while it’s hardly an answer, it’s enough.

He cradles Oikawa until his breathing begins to slow again; when he finally stops crying, Ushijima helps him wipe his face and cool his heated cheeks. Oikawa offers him a teary smile, stroking up and down his neck. “What would I do without you to mother me, hm?”

Ushijima only kisses him in response. “If they bench you as a setter then I will quit.”

Oikawa’s brows shoot upwards. “You can’t do that. Don’t be ridiculous. You’re the team _captain_. You can’t just –,”

“What use would volleyball be to me without you?” Ushijima interjects angrily; Oikawa blinks in shock at having elicited such a reaction. “In high school no matter how many times we got to nationals, I was always unsatisfied. The only time I ever felt fully in my element was the first time I played with you. It’s _useless_ without you.”

Oikawa stares at him and gnaws at his lower lip, trying not to cry again. “You’re serious, aren’t you?”

Ushijima nods solemnly.

Sighing, Oikawa rubs at his eyes and shakes his head a little. “I might leave early today. I’m not feeling too hot.”

“I’ll come with you.” Ushijima slides his hand up the back of Oikawa’s neck and smiles when Oikawa tries to protest. “It’s one practice. It’s not the end of the world.”

Oikawa sighs and relents, letting Ushijima lead him out of the locker rooms and excuse them from practice early. Their teammates send concerned glances in Oikawa’s direction, but the setter ignores them, choosing instead to focus on the steady hand at the small of his back.

As soon as they get home, Oikawa throws himself down onto the bed and groans into the covers.

“Maybe it’s good we’re not having kids,” Oikawa mumbles, feeling the mattress dip as Ushijima sits down at the edge. His hand strokes up and down Oikawa’s thigh, his eyes warm and gold and concerned. “It’d be way too much to process.” He laughs thinly, then, rolling onto his back so he can look at the ace. “Do you think they’ll kick me off the team?”

Ushijima gazes at him evenly. “Oikawa, back when you played at Kitagawa Daiichi in middle school, you were not replaced by Kageyama as the starting setter. I can see that you’re frightened – but all those awards still belong to you. Kageyama’s skill is incredible, but you have always been one step ahead of him. Maybe it is just one step – but you will always be that little bit ahead of him.”

Oikawa tips his head to the side as he’s confronted with a very real possibility: what if Kageyama had been accepted into Shiratorizawa? He’d applied, after all. Would Kageyama be the one to unlock Ushijima’s true power when paired with an equally powerful setter? Would it be Kageyama he’d seek, who he’d lust after, who he’d love unconditionally both on and off the court? Kageyama could be here, in this apartment, his lanky body spread out across the bed with Ushijima’s hand high on his thigh. Oikawa blanches at the thought, making Ushijima’s face crease further with worry.

“He could’ve gone to Shiratorizawa, you know,” he croaks. “He could have been with you. He could have been yours. Instead of me.”

Ushijima leans in, his eyelids heavy, the smallest of confident smiles licking at the corners of his mouth. “Stop being paranoid. Kageyama is a talented player, but I can’t stand kids like him. I want someone who I can work with. I don’t want someone who will follow me in blind faith and submit to my every word. I want a fighter.” He pauses, his gaze dragging up the length of Oikawa’s body. “I _need_ a fighter.”

Even after years of knowing Ushijima, it still surprises Oikawa when he finds ways with words. For someone so uncouth and blunt, he really can say the best things. Oikawa gets onto his hands and his knees, crawling over to Ushijima and sitting squarely in his lap. He plucks at the front of Ushijima’s jersey – his eyes skirting over the ‘1’ written upon it – with long fingers, fixing him with a half-hooded gaze and a coy smile. “A fighter? Oh, I like that. You’re just trying to call me bratty, Ushiwaka-chan, you can’t fool me.” Ushijima leans in to kiss him, but Oikawa leans back, just out of reach, a familiar flicker of mischief alighting in his stomach. “Besides,” he purrs, “there’s nothing you can do about it if I _do_ choose to be a brat. What _would_ you do – spank me?”

He’d meant it to be harmless teasing. But he also can’t ignore the way Ushijima’s grip tightens on his thighs or the way the ace’s eyebrows raise inquisitively in response. Oikawa finds himself biting his lip, the atmosphere suddenly very, very heavy.

“I could,” the ace says in a voice that’s more of a growl. “Until your backside is black and blue. And there’d be nothing –,” he emphasises the word by sliding his hand up to grab Oikawa’s ass over his shorts, squeezing the flesh between his fingers “– you could do about it.”

Oikawa grins and lets his hips roll against Ushijima’s. “Do you discipline all your team members like that, captain? Or am I just special?”

Ushijima is so close Oikawa can feel his breath against his chin. He doesn’t look up when he speaks, either – his eyes stay fixed on Oikawa’s cherry-red lips. “Oh, no. You’re definitely just special.” And then he kisses him, long and slow and deep, his tongue heavy and hot as it dips past Oikawa’s parted lips.

He takes the opportunity to shove Ushijima down onto his back, using his hands to pin him to the bed and rolling his hips with a sly smile. “You’re all bark and no bite, aren’t you?”

The next thing Oikawa knows his face is in the pillows and his hips are up in the air, his shorts yanked down to mid-thigh. Ushijima’s hand runs over the curve of his ass, savouring the smooth, cool skin. A shiver passes through him at the sight of it, at the way Oikawa pushes back against his hand.

“Twenty,” Ushijima rumbles. “Count them out.”

“Yes, sir,” Oikawa breathes, his voice breaking off as the first slap hits him. The sting shoots right from his ass up to crackle across his scalp. “One.”

By the time Ushijima has reached ten swats Oikawa is all but a puddle in his lap, his skin smarting and burning, legs melting apart. By the time he’s reached twenty, Oikawa’s ass is so deep a red it’s almost purple. His thighs quiver, a thin string of precum dripping from the wet lips of his cunt.

“You’re aroused?” Ushijima asks, amused, sliding one finger along Oikawa’s slit and causing the setter to arch his back and mewl. “That’s rather despicable, don’t you think?”

Oikawa somehow manages to look back over his shoulder and smirk. “Sure it is. What’re you gonna do about it?”

Ushijima slaps his ass, hard, gripping at the fiery flesh and digging his nails into the skin just to hear Oikawa squeak in pain, just to see him catch that plush lower lip between his teeth and smile that coy, challenging smile.

“I’ll tell you what I’ll do,” Ushijima says low in his ear, leaning over so he can nudge his nose against Oikawa’s hair. He doesn’t usually chose to speak at times like these, relying on action rather than words – so to have Ushijima about to explain (hopefully in graphic detail) the things he’s going to do to Oikawa has the setter practically vibrating with anticipation. He strokes a strong, warm hand up Oikawa’s spine, using the other to tilt back his chin. “I’m going to lie you down and eat you out until you’re _dripping_ , and then I’m going to fuck you slow and hard with my dick while I fuck your ass with my fingers. How does that sound?”

Oikawa only moans.

Using his leverage on Oikawa’s neck, the ace tosses him back on the bed and watches hungrily as Oikawa spreads his legs open and reaches his hands above his head, his dark eyes glittering. Ushijima slowly leans down to push his hands beneath Oikawa’s jersey, sliding it up over his head before whipping off his own shirt.

“You didn’t say you were gonna – _oh_ –,” Oikawa throws his head back with a gasp when Ushijima’s hot mouth closes around one of his nipples, sucking it between his teeth before nipping it sharply. The flesh is soft and spongy and sweet, and Ushijima has no reservations in his attention until the nub is rosy and swollen and hard. From there he kisses downwards, over Oikawa’s navel and to the soft patch of pubic hair; he casts only a fleeting look upwards before closing his eyes and pressing the pad of his tongue to Oikawa’s slit.

Oikawa doesn’t think Ushijima’s ever eaten him out so enthusiastically before – which is saying something, since one of Ushijima’s favourite places to be is between Oikawa’s legs. He laps and sucks at him like a starving man eating for the first time, feasting with lips and tongue and teeth until Oikawa is writhing and grasping at the sheets, the muscles of his thighs clamped firmly around Ushijima’s head.

“Not yet,” Ushijima gasps, pulling back with the lower half of his face drenched in Oikawa’s pussy juices. His tongue flicks out to lick at it. “Turn over.”

Oikawa rolls over onto his hands and knees, letting his torso drop to the mattress so he can present his red, raw ass just the way Ushijima likes it. He can feel his own wetness on his thighs, and it’s not long before Ushijima’s thick fingers push up between his folds to spread the sticky ache all the way up inside him.

“ _Ohh,_ ” Oikawa pants, arching his back. “C’mon, fuck me already, stop messing around –,” His teeth clamp down hard on his tongue when Ushijima begins to thrust his fingers in deep, curling them and scissoring until Oikawa’s legs spread further apart all on their own and his hips begin to stutter. Soon he’s got four fingers crammed knuckle-deep inside Oikawa’s pussy, feeling around the soft, mushy mess.

“Sometimes I wish you were the one with the cunt,” Oikawa bites, though he’s betrayed by the moan that soaks his voice. “S-so you’d know how… how it feels to be so _stuffed_ …”

“Think I could fit my whole hand in this tight little thing?”

Oikawa balks, hips jerking against the fingers massaging around inside him. “D-don’t you _dare_ –,”

“I was just kidding.” Ushijima presses a kiss to the small of Oikawa’s back. He withdraws his fingers, coated with a clear, viscous slime that he sucks of them like ambrosia. It’s sweet yet salty at the same time, like perfume upended in a glass of milk.

Ushijima does just what he promised – he fucks into Oikawa in long, slow strokes, working on hitting as deep as he can rather than on his speed. He knows it drives Oikawa insane when he goes slowly, giving him stimulation enough to make him buzz, but not enough to satisfy him. He makes sure Oikawa cums first, though, flipping him over onto his back and kneading the setter’s pretty nipples between his fingers until his chest is arching away from the bed in an effort to press further into Ushijima’s hands. The way Oikawa’s cunt squeezes and flutters around the hot, meaty cock inside him is almost enough to hurt, and Ushijima flinches, right on the verge of pain. He cums with the broad head of his cock pressed hard against the mouth of Oikawa’s womb, his fingers pressing against the setter’s flushed, soft skin, savouring every single inch of him.

 

* * *

 

 

That night, Oikawa’s sleep is deep and black. He loves sleep like this – it’s impenetrable.

At least for a little while.

Stress, he’d once been told, is a catalyst for nightmares. Oikawa’s own nightmares have always come to him in strange shapes and forms, often grotesque, often cryptic. They’re the kinds of nightmares that would linger in the back of his mind for weeks – sometimes months – afterwards. Just like the time he’d dreamt of the black, bloody tar that had poured from between his legs and bubbled with the faces of children; he’d dream of things that would shake him to the very marrow of his bones.

Despite Ushijima’s warm, solid presence beside him and the comforting hum of the traffic in the streets below, Oikawa can’t shake the way the blackness of his sleep begins to prickle. Like a magnet to iron filings, the blackness is slowly drawn away from the forefront of his mind; it reveals more darkness, but this time of a different kind, endless and cold and sharp. Could darkness be sharp? He has no idea.

 _Kageyama Tobio_ – Oikawa can’t shake the sight of his face. It’s familiar but still unnervingly different, longer and finer-featured than before. _Just_ different enough to be upsetting. His talent, too, is much the same as it had always been, but it’s just enough to set Oikawa on edge, just enough to be unfamiliar. Just enough to take away the certainty – to make Oikawa unsure of whether to be intimidated or not.

Kageyama’s face and skill takes many different forms in those dreams; he can’t recognise any of them, just the way they make him feel, like the sight of muddy hailstorm clouds on the horizon or the suck of the ocean before a tsunami.

The, finally, Oikawa finds himself embodied. He’s clad in a sweeping white sheet (or… something?) reminiscent of cotton or summer mornings. He looks down to see his feet, pale and swimming with blue veins. Something inside him burns – his gaunt hands tear at the white about him, rending it apart to bare his midsection.

He wants to scream – the shriek rises in his throat, but he makes no sound. He can’t. His flesh hangs in ribbons and chunks from his ribs, the bone of his spine glinting white like the flash of teeth; all he can see is melting flesh, bubbling, boiling, his organs slowly withering away into the cores of rotten fruit. _Rotting. I’m rotting._

 _I’m_ –

 

* * *

 

 

“…kawa. Oikawa!”

Oikawa jerks awake with a gasp; his body vaults up from the pillows, sticky and freezing and drenched with sweat. His throat feels raw and parched. There are hands on his upper arms and golden eyes staring at him through the darkness. He’s still breathing hard, his heart galloping in his ribs, his lungs screaming for air.

Ushijima uses a hand to push the sweat-damp hair back from Oikawa’s face. The ace’s own expression is crumpled in concern, but he doesn’t speak, not until he knows Oikawa is ready.

“Do you want something to –,”

“No,” Oikawa gasps, shaking his head more wildly than he’d intended. His shaking hands – his clammy palms – find Ushijima’s face through the darkness. “No.”

“What can I do?” Ushijima’s voice is almost inaudible against the sounds of the city outside, his skin flaring with the dim lights that streak across the ceiling. Oikawa only presses his face into Ushijima’s neck and struggles to get his breathing under control.

“Just… don’t leave me.”

Ushijima is more than happy to oblige.


	9. Invigoration

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SUP GUYS ONE CHAPTER TO GO AAAAAA
> 
> this chapter is rather short, but hopefully rather sweet as well. enjoy!

Oikawa wakes up the next morning with his head swimming.

It doesn’t feel so bad until he sits up – even then it’s bearable, but as soon as he gets to his feet a wave of nausea rolls over him strong enough to make him feel dizzy. He almost runs to the bathroom to vomit, but the nausea passes as soon as it came, leaving only the lingering discomfort high in Oikawa’s stomach. “Ugh.”

“Are you all right?” Ushijima asks blearily from where he still lies in bed; he’d stirred when Oikawa had moved, rousing him in time enough to see the setter lurching and pressing the back of his hand to his mouth. Oikawa waves a hand in dismissal, ruffling his hair and rubbing his eyes with a yawn.

“Yeah. Don’t mind me. Just stress.” He tries his best to give a reassuring smile, but he isn’t entirely sure it sticks. From what he can see on Ushijima’s face he guesses it isn’t convincing.

He hears Ushijima getting up as he leaves the room, heading out to the living room and the joint kitchen to make himself a cup of coffee in a bid to settle his stomach. He leans against the counter as he drinks it, holding both hands around the cup, and Ushijima comes out of their bedroom to meet him a few minutes later. He walks right up to the counter, placing a hand either side of Oikawa and leaning in to kiss his neck. They stand there nuzzling for a bit (which would have disgusted Oikawa’s past self to an endless degree, he’s sure) before Oikawa puts his cup in the sink again. The apartment is wide and white and airy, the windows letting in the eastern morning sun so the place is flooded with light. Oikawa loves it at this time of day, just after the early-morning rush when there’s a brief heartbeat of silence throughout the city.

It takes a few days for them both to get used to the routine in Tokyo. With the bustle of the city and their strict training regimen, they’re forced to get up early and stay busy until they can collapse, exhausted, in bed. There’s so much more to _do_ here – they have to train, pay bills, buy groceries, clean, and it’s all so much more difficult without the aid of Ushijima’s mother. But they manage.

It takes a few days for Oikawa to get used to getting up early, too. Tokyo isn’t like Miyagi. There’s no time for sleep-ins or golden mornings, no silent dawns, no spare moments to watch the sun as it creeps across the sky. At first Oikawa ends up disoriented and grumpy, but by the end of their first week of training he gets up at four o’clock every morning like he was born for it. They’re too busy to complain, after all.

Sometimes the nightmares come back to haunt him, especially after a stressful training session or a late bill invoice. Especially when Kageyama does something incredible on the court – incredible enough to make the coach beam and to make Oikawa feel very small. Ushijima tells him not to worry. He can’t help it.

He’s getting better. Even _he_ can see that much – he can feel it. Oikawa’s bones are getting stronger, his muscles recuperating and his stamina increasing. He’s feeling the old thrill, now, reminiscent of the Olympic court. It’s enough to glean small, proud smiles from Ushijima and contented nods from their coach. He can feel Kageyama’s eyes on him all the while, though, and he finds it unnerving. But he also tries his best to ignore it. If he’s going to defend his position as the starting setter of Japan’s national team, then he can’t afford to be distracted by his competition. Oikawa has learned better than anybody that obsession will only bring him down. Ushijima has taught him that. Oikawa _knows_ that dwelling on it will cause him more pain than he needs. He remembers their first year out of college when he’d been so nervous that he’d almost been sick; Ushijima had taken him aside and put his hand in the middle of Oikawa’s chest. “Focus only on yourself,” he’d said. “Focus only on us.”

He’d learned that letting his mind wander to things outside the match was a sure-fire way to failure. When he and Kageyama (who, since it’s his first time on the team, often gets subbed into different positions) get put in the same rotation he thinks of the boy as nothing more than a teammate. He wipes all their past transgressions from his mind, sees him as a piece of machinery necessary for victory. He can’t afford to be personally biased in his tosses – if Kageyama is in a better place than Ushijima, then that’s whom he’ll toss to. There’s no room for mistakes.

Ushijima doesn’t verbally commend him. Neither does the coach. It’s not like Oikawa is _thirsting_ for attention, but a little affirmation would be nice. Soon enough Ushijima begins to touch him briefly on the court, sometimes smiling at him when he does, and the coach gives him approving nods whenever he catches his eye. Oikawa has to take a second to breathe.

Somehow, though, he doesn’t feel better. Usually rampant exercise is enough to set his body straight, but this time there’s a certain icky-ness clinging to him that just _won’t let go_. He tries to ignore it, to push it to the back of his mind, and sometimes it allows itself to be ignored. Other times, however, it hits him like a ton of bricks. Thankfully it usually happens before training begins, and not terribly often.

“Oikawa-san!” Kageyama’s voice calls above the chatter of the team as they get ready to begin the day. Oikawa, who’d just finished taking his water bottle and towel out of his bag, turns towards the sound. He doesn’t make a habit of speaking to Kageyama – while he tolerates him on the court, certainly, he still finds it in his heart to be bitter.

“Tobio-chan, good morning!” he bites out at him with a smile as false as the coach’s new dentures. “Why are you talking to me?”

“Um…” Kageyama looks nervous; his steely eyes flicker around Oikawa’s face, then down over his body, which makes Oikawa’s lips tighten. “I was just… worried.”

“Worried?” Oikawa snaps, his smile turning into a nervous sneer. “Why would you be worried about me?”

Kageyama’s fidgeting, now, even though his hands are clasped behind his back. He’s like a bigger version of his middle school self. _Just as dumb. Just as annoying._ “Are you… are you eating properly, Oikawa-san?”

Oikawa frowns. “Of course I am. Do you think I don’t take my health seriously, Tobio-chan?”

“That’s not…” Again, Kageyama’s eyes drop and raise, scouting not-so-subtly over Oikawa’s body. “I was just asking because you look a little fatter.”

A few of their teammates had been listening in on their exchange, and their eyebrows shoot up towards their hairline, some of them pressing their lips together as they try not to laugh. Oikawa flushes angrily, his fists balling at his side. He turns on his heel, then, pointing at their number 7, a tall dark-haired middle blocker. “Do you think I’ve gotten fat?!”

The blocker shrugs, his face the very expression of _I don’t want to tell you the truth in case you gut me_. “I mean… I wouldn’t say _fat._ You might’ve put on a bit of weight.”

Oikawa has never felt so humiliated in his life. He’s not sure what he wants to do more – punch Kageyama in that stupid face of his or sink to the ground and cry.

In the end, he does neither.

“Oikawa.” Ushijima’s deep baritone rises above the rest of the voices in the gym, and Oikawa turns to see him standing only a little way away. He beckons. Oikawa, casting a withering glare at Kageyama (who obviously has no idea of his mistake), before going over to him. Ushijima’s hand finds his shoulder and he gives it a squeeze. “You look upset.”

“Did you hear what he said?” Oikawa hisses. “He said I’ve gotten _fat_.”

“I heard. Usually you’d ignore something like that, though. Why did you react so viscerally?”

Suddenly Oikawa wants to hit him, too. He wrenches his shoulder out from Ushijima’s grasp, going to stuff his things back into his gym bag. “I’m leaving,” he calls to the coach, slinging the strap over his shoulder. “Don’t miss me too much.”

He doesn’t look back on his way out the door.

“Ushijima,” the coach says tiredly, pinching the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger. “Maybe you can find out what’s gotten into him lately. Go and talk some sense into him. We don’t have time for Oikawa to throw a tantrum.”

Ushijima nods, grabbing his own things before starting off after Oikawa at a jog. He catches up to him at the train station, grabbing the setter by his upper arm and forcing him to look up. “What’s the matter with you?”

Again, Oikawa tears himself from the ace’s grip. “Nothing’s the matter. Stop _grabbing_ at me like that.” He digs his elbow into Ushijima’s side to put some space between them. “I’m going home. I need to go back to sleep so I can ignore everything.”

“What –,” Ushijima’s reply is broken off as the train pulls in and the doors slide open. Oikawa immediately boards the train, Ushijima following in hot pursuit. They end up taking the train back to the station by their apartment complex, spending both the commute and the walk back to the block arguing back and forth about things that, usually, would be meaningless.

“Fine,” Ushijima relents eventually. He kicks off his shoes and drops his bag. “Go lie down. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you so stressed before.”

Oikawa doesn’t reply. He only storms into the bedroom, wrangling himself out of his gym clothes. When his head is caught in his shirt, though, the entire world begins to spin, and nausea punches him in the gut.

He only just makes it to the bathroom in time.

Ushijima, alerted by the sounds of explosive vomiting, swings around the bathroom doorway to find Oikawa crouched over the toilet bowl. _Again._ His annoyance is overwhelmed by visceral concern, and he crouches down beside him, one hand steady on his back. “Are you all right? You’ve been unwell a lot recently. Maybe we should see a doctor –,”

“I’m fine,” Oikawa sniffles. “It’s all right. I just need to rest for a bit, okay?” His voice is softer, more forgiving this time. Ushijima hands him a wad of toilet paper and helps him wipe the mess from his nose and mouth.

“Just call me if you need anything.”

When the bedroom door clicks shut Oikawa takes a long drink of water before dropping his sweat pants and putting on a pair of soft cotton shorts. “Everything’s going to shit,” he mumbles as he picks a shirt out of the dresser, turning towards the standing mirror as he pulls it down over his head. He doesn’t look _that_ fat, right? Sure, he’s gotten a little softer about the chest, and his belly is pooching out a little, but apart from that he looks normal, he’s _sure_ of it –

 

And then he freezes, eyes riveted just below his navel, and his heart all but stops in his chest.

 

_Oh my God._


	10. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> merry christmas everyone!! sorry i put off uploading this chapter but i wanted to upload it on christmas as a kind-of gift thingo. please note i know jack shit about gyn clinics or whatever so don't take what i write as law. it's probably wrong. tips on things i get wrong are also appreciated, blessed readers.
> 
>  **also wanna throw in a squick warning for this chapter:** there is clinical talk of vaginas and cervices etc., so if that kind of thing makes you uncomfortable just be aware.

When Oikawa screams, Ushijima almost jumps clean out of his skin.

He races to the bedroom, throwing the door open and half expecting Oikawa to be lying on the floor in a pool of his own blood. Instead, he finds the setter staring at the standing mirror with his shirt up around his ribcage and his eyes as wide as saucers.

“What’s the matter?” Ushijima asks, the urgency in his voice fading as he realises Oikawa isn’t actually hurt. Oikawa still doesn’t look at him; he beckons him with one hand, and Ushijima obediently goes to stand beside him.

“Look,” Oikawa breathes. “Do you see it?”

Ushijima stares at their reflection. All he can see is him and Oikawa standing side-by-side, Oikawa in his pyjamas and Ushijima still in his gym clothes. Why is Oikawa holding up his shirt? Why is he turning to the side –

Ushijima blinks once. Twice. Three times. He squints a little bit and then points to the mirror, right above Oikawa’s waistband. “That… that doesn’t look like a fat deposit.”

Oikawa’s heart is beating so violently he wonders if Ushijima can hear it; blood pounds in his ears and his fingers feel cold. But it’s a _good_ cold. An _I can’t believe this is happening_ cold. “No, it isn’t.” Holding up his shirt with one hand, Oikawa tentatively slides the other down over his navel, noting the slight swell of his abdomen as he passes his fingers over it. “Ushiwaka-chan, that’s not a fat deposit. I think it might be a baby.”

Ushijima feels muted. His eyes are fixed on the slight swell of Oikawa’s abdomen in their reflection; it’s hardly noticeable to the untrained eye, but to Ushijima it looks so incredibly strange that he wonders how he didn’t notice it earlier. He raises a hand to gently touch his fingertips to Oikawa’s skin, his breath coming very shallow in his lungs. His entire stomach feels like it’s squeezing.

“Are… are you sure?” His mouth is dry and he tries his best not to get his hopes up in case it’s just… a mistake. His hands itch to move, to do _something_ , to touch Oikawa’s face or his stomach or _anywhere_. “I should call the clinic. Make an appointment with Shimizu-san. Just to be sure.”

Oikawa doesn’t object when Ushijima picks up the phone and dials the clinic. He just sits on the end of the bed gazing at himself in the mirror, only looking away to glance down at his abdomen. His hands spread protectively over it, his eyes sparkling. It’s like he doesn’t even realise he’s in their bedroom or that Ushijima is right there with him, on the phone to Kiyoko’s secretary.

“Apparently we are high priority,” he tells Oikawa after hanging up. “We can go in tomorrow.”

For the first time Oikawa looks up at him and smiles a smile so wide Ushijima thinks his cheeks might split. He hasn’t seen Oikawa smile like this in a _long_ time – he might as well be hiding the sun behind his teeth. He takes Oikawa’s face into his hands and kisses him right on his smiling mouth. “I love you, Tōru.”

“I love you too,” Oikawa mumbles against his lips, kissing him back, hands still splayed over his stomach. “God, I hope I’m not just seeing things.”

Ushijima shakes his head. “I don’t think you are.”

 

They spend the rest of the day at home. By the time evening falls they’re already lying in bed, Oikawa lying on his back with a book in his hands and Ushijima lying with his head on Oikawa’s stomach, his cheek pressed to the slight swell, eyes closed. One of Oikawa’s hands moves down to stroke the ace’s olive-brown hair, his thumb stroking soothingly over the smooth plane of his forehead. Ushijima’s skin is warm against his own, and he feels a flutter in his stomach whenever he moves. Something feels different – he feels warmer, like he’s glowing, as if a spark had taken inside of him. But he’s still nervous – nervous about the appointment tomorrow, about possibly being told it really is just fat. He tries his hardest not to think about it, and when he’s dozing off he tiredly asks Ushijima to hold him close. Just to make sure he isn’t terrorised by his dreams.

 

* * *

 

 

“…good morning.”

Oikawa is woken by gentle kisses being placed along his cheek. Then his nose. Then his lips. Then his neck.

Sighing, he giggles, pushing Ushijima’s face away only to have the ace roll his body over him, pinning him down. “Good morning.” Just when Oikawa thinks Ushijima is about to kiss him, the ace pulls back and swings himself out of bed, leaving Oikawa warm and sleepy and desperate to be kissed. “God. You’re so rude.”

“Our appointment is in an hour,” Ushijima calls from the kitchen. Oikawa can hear the stove turn on and the distinct sound of the kettle being put on. “You should get up.”

 _But I’m so warm,_ Oikawa thinks. _And so sleepy._

He only gets up when Ushijima comes back into the bedroom again, leaning over the setter and kissing him deeply, helping him to sit up and kissing his sheet-creased neck until Oikawa fully wakes. The world still feels dreamy. He wraps his arms around Ushijima’s neck and lays his head on his shoulder.

They leave a little while after, Oikawa eating his last piece of toast as they walk to the train station. It would be easier to see a doctor in Tokyo, but Oikawa’s only trusted doctor is still abroad, which leaves them with Shimizu Kiyoko. They don’t really mind having to catch the train back to Miyagi; this time, though, Ushijima leaves one hand free to hold Oikawa’s. They don’t let go the entire way.

When they arrive at the clinic Oikawa has to wipe his sweaty palms on his shirt. He’s nervous – he doesn’t know what the results will be and he’s too scared to speculate. The hand on the back of his neck is the only thing grounding him, and Ushijima sticks close by his body the entire time they sign themselves in and wait for the nurse to show them in.

“Welcome back,” Kiyoko says after they sit down in her office. She has her clipboard with her again, a pen tucked behind her ear. “Your call surprised me.”

“We were surprised too,” Oikawa replies. “Which is why we’re here. Just to be sure.”

“Have you taken any pregnancy tests? Of the store-bought variety, I mean.”

Oikawa grimaces and shrugs. “Not for a little while. We both kind of accepted that kids weren’t gonna happen, so we didn’t bother.”

She smiles that odd, muted smile of hers and hands Oikawa a small, sealed plastic bag from a box stored in the shelves behind her desk. “Take a few minutes to try out this. It’s not really medical protocol, but it’s probably a good place to start.”

Oikawa feels bad about making Ushijima wait outside; he looks so nervous. But Oikawa doesn’t really want to suffer the indignity of Ushijima seeing him in the stirrups, either, so he offers him a rueful smile as Kiyoko leads him into the exam room. He takes a few minutes in the little bathroom to take the pregnancy test – it’s the same type he remembers having taken before, a simple plastic stick with a little window. He makes sure to clean and wipe it down before handing it to Kiyoko (despite her gloved hands), who places it in a little plastic tray on the desk.

“You want to be absolutely sure?” she asks, and Oikawa nods firmly. No room for mistakes. “Well, we can take a blood sample, if you like. Or I can take a look at your cervix, which is usually a pretty foolproof indicator. You said you two are monogamous?”

Oikawa nods again as he lifts himself into the stirrups. Kiyoko’s cool indifference never fails to put him at ease.

“So… no risk of infection in that respect, then.”

Oikawa flinches at the cold metal of the speculum, keeping his eyes tracked firmly on the ceiling, his heart galloping so hard he half expects it to leap right out of his throat.

“When the body falls pregnant, the cervix changes shape, colour, and consistency in the muscle density,” Kiyoko explains. “It’s markedly different from any kind of infection, so there’s not really any chance of a misdiagnosis.” Oikawa exhales when she sits back, removes the speculum, and lets him down. He waits as she does to check the urine test again, his heart jumping when she lets out a small huff of laughter. She looks at him, smiles, and places her pen in her pocket.

“Congratulations, Oikawa-san. You’re very much pregnant.”

He just gapes at her. He knows he shouldn’t really be surprised, but he _is._

Kiyoko takes Oikawa back to her office, and as soon as he steps foot in the room he launches himself into Ushijima’s arms, pressing his face into his neck. “We’re gonna have a baby,” he whispers, feeling as out of breath as he might after a match. “I’m pregnant.” Ushijima glances urgently at Kiyoko.

“He’s undeniably pregnant,” she assures him with a smile. “I’d say he’s about eight weeks along, which is more than enough time for the symptoms to begin to show. Since you weren’t actively trying – under the assumption you couldn’t get pregnant – I can see why you didn’t really notice it until now.” She takes a moment to look at them before she laughs. “I’m sorry – it’s just so strange seeing you both like this. All I remember is you two hating each other.”

“I never hated him,” Ushijima corrects her. “He hated me.”

Oikawa just rolls his eyes.

 

Kiyoko sees them both out and congratulates them again. They walk in silence back to the station, taking the time to mull over their own thoughts. It’s a comfortable silence, a warm one, the kind shared between loved ones when no words need to be said. On the train back to Tokyo Ushijima rests one hand on Oikawa’s abdomen. Oikawa falls asleep like that, Ushijima’s palm warm over the material of his shirt.

“It’s ours,” he mumbles, only half-awake. “It’s our baby.”

 

* * *

 

 

Ushijima can’t stop touching him.

When they get back to Tokyo his hand remains anchored on the slight swell of Oikawa’s stomach, the other arm wrapped around his waist. It’s warm. Protective. It’s not like Oikawa minds all the attention, of course – in fact, he rather likes it. He loves seeing the wonder in Ushijima’s eyes as he gently lifts Oikawa’s shirt up and sees the proof of the little part of him that’s growing inside his lover, and Oikawa himself can’t stop gazing down at it. The bump – as small as it is – seems so out of place, so unfamiliar, yet also like it was meant to be there all along. The feeling of warmth that radiates out from Oikawa’s solar plexus reminds him of coming home after a long period of absence.

That evening, after they’ve returned to their apartment, Oikawa sits propped up against the bed pillows with a book in one hand, the other carding through Ushijima’s hair. The ace has taken to lying between Oikawa’s legs with his cheek pressed to his stomach, eyes closed, and if Oikawa didn’t know any better he’d think he was sleeping. He knows he isn’t. It’s an endearing little habit.

“You can be so strange sometimes,” Oikawa muses over the top of his book, stroking the hair away from Ushijima’s brow. The ace glances up at him, then, and raises his face a fraction of an inch away from Oikawa’s skin.

“Does this upset you?” he asks. “I can stop –,”

“ _No_ , it doesn’t upset me. I like it.” Oikawa gives him a quiet, content little smile.

“It is hard to believe,” Ushijima murmurs against Oikawa’s skin. “I promise I will protect you for as long as I live.” Oikawa blushes, but realises a moment later that Ushijima isn’t talking to him. He’s talking to their baby, surely no bigger than a jellybean at this point, his lips pressed just over Oikawa’s navel. “I will protect both of you.”

Oikawa doesn’t mean to let tears well along his waterline. They do so without his consent and he has to blink rapidly to rid himself of them. He pulls Ushijima up so their faces are level, then kisses him gently on his lips.

“We’re a family, now.”

 

End.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> keep your eyes peeled for part 3 of this series! I hate to admit it but my hq fire is burning a bit low at the moment, so updates will probably be slow, but idk if I have the heart to just STOP writing this series considering how involved i've gotten. i should be uploading it around new year's so look out for it! ALSO THANK YOU SO SO MUCH TO MY BEAUTIFUL BETA kuroimachi, who is both a beautiful person and a magnificent editor. you have improved my life, bless ur soul
> 
> thank you so much to everyone who took the time to read, leave kudos, comment, bookmark etc.; you're one of the lights of my life and i'm really REALLY happy i've been able to give you something you enjoy! anyway i hope yall have a merry christmas and get loads of whack gifts <3


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